


The Price On a Heart (These Days)

by carmilla_unscripted



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Angst, F/F, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Sex, Slow Burn, Smut, Swan Queen Supernova 2019 (Once Upon a Time)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-10
Updated: 2019-09-10
Packaged: 2020-09-30 17:22:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 94,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20450780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carmilla_unscripted/pseuds/carmilla_unscripted
Summary: There is no magic more powerful than that of a beating human heart. Bounty hunter Emma Swan reluctantly agrees to harvest them for a shady witch named Regina - but only if Regina will save Emma’s dying son, Henry, in return.Written for Swanqueen Supernova ‘19!





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Price on a Heart (These Days) [Art]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20370259) by [achromacat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/achromacat/pseuds/achromacat). 
**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to the sq supernova team! I can’t even imagine the amount of work that goes into organizing an event like this. 
> 
> And thank you to Cyan for their patience and willingness to read this big ol’ mess and produce some truly lovely paintings 
> 
> I didn’t intend for this to become a 90k word monstrosity, but I hope it brings a little joy to your day, and if you stick around to the end I truly appreciate it! 
> 
> Slow writer that I am, this story is unbeta’d and mostly unrevised due to time constrictions, so any (and there are many) errors are my own.

Regina Mills loathed firstborn daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming, heir apparent to the Enchanted Forest.

Correction; loath implied a certain degree of hatred, and Regina harbored none of that for the squirming, bean-shaped bundle cradled in Snow White’s arms. It wasn’t fair to hate a baby just for existing.

Repulsed, she decided. Repulsed implied disgust, and she certainly had that in spades. Her newborn betrothed, even in peaceful slumber, looked like one of the skinned animals her father brought back from his hunting trips, except this one had a red face and wrinkles and could not be eaten.

If someone could eat Princess Rosemary, that would solve several of her problems.

Sharp nails buried themselves in her shoulder; Regina’s pulse doubled, and she didn’t have to look to feel Cora’s glare burning into the back of her skull.

Cora was what Regina called her mother in her head when they were in the middle of one of their arguments.

Snow White was looking at her expectantly; she had the polite half-smile, half-grimace on her face that people got when Cora was harsh with Regina in public.

Regina ducked into her deepest curtsy and murmured, “Your Highness.”

Cora’s fingers squeezed. “Speak up, child.”

Regina reminded herself that this would soon be over. For the time being. “Greetings, My Queen,” she said, voice ringing through the parlor. Cora always said there was a certain way of speaking to get people’s attention, and had once made Regina practice in front of the mirror for a month until she’d considered it perfected. “Salutations on your good health and that of the Princess.”

Snow White’s smile softened. Regina wondered how someone so beautiful could produce something with so many reddish creases.

“Enough of that,” the queen said, reclining on her chaise. “Lady Cora, please, be seated. There’s no need for the formalities.” She laughed, high and melodic like the ringing of a bell. “Not if we’re going to be family.”

Regina could usually tell when Cora had won whatever wordless struggle was played out among nobility when they were trying to assert the pecking order among themselves. It didn’t matter that Cora was only a Lady——albeit the Lady of a great manor——while Snow White had unadulterated royal blood running in her veins, passed down through six or seven generations. The corners of Snow’s mouth were pinched despite her relaxed stature. Regina wasn’t surprised that even queens were intimidated by her mother.

Cora perched nimbly on the edge of a chair; Regina stood straight-backed by her side until the queen gave her a reassuring smile and gestured for her to sit on the end of her own chaise.

Regina’s eyes flashed to her mother. This was not what they had practiced. Curtsy, smile politely, exchange platitudes, don’t talk more than you have to. Someday this would all be over and end with Regina crowned queen.

Cora nodded minutely, signaling for Regina to do as she was told. Her icy eyes flashed a warning; if you disgrace us, I will rip your toenails out one by one myself.

At least, that was what Regina envisioned for the punishment she’d receive if she stepped once out of line. It would probably be something worse, though, like Cora finally making good on her threat to sell Regina’s horse to the meat market.

“There, you see?” Snow White said, her eyes filled with tired pride as she lifted the baby closer to Regina. “Isn’t she beautiful?”

Regina made a non-committal noise and edged away so that the baby’s bald head didn’t brush against her arm. Snow White didn’t seem to notice but Cora cleared her throat.

“She’s very beautiful,” Regina said.

Snow White blushed pink. Regina wasn’t used to someone whose emotions flashed like fireworks across their features. Cora liked to keep her guessing, and her father was too soft-spoken and mild for the sorts of honest reactions that played on Snow White’s face.

“Would you like to hold her?” the queen asked.

Regina clamped her mouth shut. She tried very hard not to reveal the horror in her eyes.

Cora made a quiet, guttural sound. Like she had something caught in her throat.

“Of course,” she forced herself to say.

Snow White giggled. “Well, don’t sound so excited about it.”  
  
It was Regina’s turn to blush. The queen’s expression softened. “No one’s forcing you, honey.” There was almost a pointed inflection in the way she said it.

But the queen, for all her political power, had no power over the fate that awaited Regina at her mother’s hand if she declined this one gesture. She could feel Cora’s eyes on her, their swirling icy blackness that could erupt with madness and magic at the smallest provocation.

She swallowed. “I want to.”

Snow directed Regina to the proper forearm position and before she could protest, there was a babe in her arms. The bundle was lighter than she’d expected but bulkier, as the baby was swaddled in several layers of the softest blankets Regina had ever felt. For Princess Rosemary, no expense had been spared.

Snow gently guided Regina’s shoulders back and forth. “She likes it when you sway like this.”

Regina didn’t know how a baby could like anything, at that age, but she did as instructed and rocked the bundle, wrapped so tightly that its face was hardly visible except for a reddish-pink nose and cherry cheeks and the bluest eyes, and a halo of golden hair.

“She’s so wrinkly,” Regina murmured down at the scrunched face without thinking.

Cora’s breath hitched.

Snow White laughed, making both Mills jump. The queen clapped in delight. “There, you see? There’s no need for formalities here.”

Regina did not meet her mother’s eyes for the rest of the visit, and did not speak unless to mumble pleasantries to the revolving door of nobility come to pay their respects to the heir. They engaged neither her nor Cora in conversation, but Regina could feel their eyes tracking her posture, the shape of her face, the quality of her dress and collar, the gold necklace that rested on her sternum——an heirloom they had acquired by luck when a distant cousin died childless.

They wanted to see the face of the future queen consort. They wanted to know if she was worthy of their princess.

Regina wondered what they saw.

As soon as their carriage set off for home, Cora slapped her in the face.

Regina snapped her jaw in discomfort and tasted blood on the inside of her cheek.

“You are lucky Snow White is such a sentimental fool,” Cora sneered. “Were you trying to cost us our lives? A less forgiving monarch would have seen us to the guillotine.”

“I’m sorry, Mother,” she said, staring at her skirts.

“Look at me when I’m talking to you.” Cora clipped. “All the simpering apologies in the world will mean nothing, nothing, if you are so stupid as to insult the crown princess in front of her mother. The queen.”

Snow White’s sympathy had made Regina bold, it seemed, for she replied, “But I wasn’t insulting her, Mother. I was making an observation. She was wrink—”

Cora backhanded her across the unmarked side of her face. “I will repeat,” she said. “You are not seen. You are not heard. You speak when spoken too, you learn your dance forms, you stop spending so much time with your father in the library or riding that ridiculous horse—”

“Mother, no.”

Cora grasped her wrist and yanked her body so that Regina nearly fell into her mother’s lap. She could see the purple magic swirling in her mother’s fierce eyes. “You will be queen. You will do this for us. It is what you were born for.”

Regina had always considered her desires simple in the face of her mother’s extravagant schemes. A book and chair by the fire, a hunting trip with her father to the wooded landscape of the mountains, in a cabin without running water that Cora refused to enter…A day following deer trails with Rocinante for no reason at all, and basking in the pond at the center of the forest.

But her mother had devoted the entire seven years of Regina’s young life to securing a place for her at the side of the princess. When she was five-years-old, they’d lost a whole year to Cora’s laboratory experiments; no outings, no hunting, no riding or friends. But at the end of it Regina was promised to the Queen’s firstborn. Princess Rosemary had entered the betrothal before she’d even been conceived.

In return, the Mills family offered their own private acres to alleviate the famine that had swept across the heart of the kingdom.

The time of hunger was in its third year and so the Mills’ land, kept rich by the underwater springs that trickled down from the mountains (and a tad of her mother’s magic) was one of the only agricultural enclaves left.

Once, when Regina was younger and stupider, she’d asked her mother, “But why can’t you use magic to make all the farms grow food?” She was sent to bed without supper.

The effects of the famine had funneled down to even their valley oasis, and strict rations were being enforced, with violence when necessary. A servant had been caught stealing a slab of salted pork from the cellar; Cora had called for his head, but Regina’s father, Henry Sr., had managed to coax her down to a more reasonable punishment. It was decided that the servant and his family were to be banished from the manor and surrounding serfs, to make their own way if they weren’t willing to make sacrifices for the good of all.

What Henry didn’t know was that the night of their departure, Cora took Regina for an ‘outing’ on horseback.

Regina was too stunned by Cora’s request for her presence—on what she’d been told was a benevolent summer evening ride—to question it.

When the servant finally crossed the border that night, there was a cavity in his chest where his heart had once pumped blood through his veins. Cora tied a box to her side-saddle; the edges of the box pulsed with a faint red glow. The servant’s husband and sister were crying, horrified for their loved one and terrified that they would meet the same fate. 

“Remember I had mercy on this night,” Cora warned as she stared down at their trembling features. She kept them in suspense for several moments before finally clicking her tongue and sending them off across the border like dogs.

Cora had not spoken on the journey home, nor had Regina, and the silence reminded her of a vigil she had once kept for a distant, dead relative.

((()))

The second time Regina saw Princess Rosemary, she was a tumbling toddler with a knack for putting herself in precarious positions.

Rosemary——Rose——was being hosted at the manor for the summer while her parents went off to settle a skirmish, one of many that the land had seen since the famine had siphoned all the people’s neighborly goodwill from the realm. Even with the Mills’ generous contributions, rations were strictly controlled and tensions ran high.

The Mills manor was an oasis from these conflicts, and Regina suspected it had more to do with her mother’s magic than she let on. The valley had stayed lush and fertile throughout even the worst of the dry spells. Snow White and Prince Charming attributed it to their unique location at the base of the mountains, with its springs and run off that kept the soil hydrated and fertile. Cora had intentionally underplayed her affinity for magic, so that the queen and king believed what abilities she possessed amounted to not much more than parlor tricks. Regina was sworn to silence on the matter.

For all that, Cora had promised the royal highnesses that the safety wards that protected the manor and its grounds were foolproof, and their darling princess would be safe with the Mills for the summer while Snow and her husband went and fulfilled their royal duties.

Rosemary could not have been safer on the Mills’ property; she was in no danger from Cora, who considered her insurance, and Henry Sr. doted on her. If anything was going to cause Rosemary harm it was going to be Rosemary herself.

One morning, Regina answered a hesitant knock on her bedroom door and found a young nursemaid outside. The girl bore a red slash on her arm, a sure sign she had displeased Cora somehow. It was an old mark, not fresh. Cora’s abuse was par for the course when you worked in the Mills’ family ancestral home, and the nursemaid’s concern now had to do with a different matter entirely.

“Pardon me, Miss, but have you seen the princess?” The girl winced and lowered her eyes in a sort of fearful anticipation Regina knew had been cultivated by her mother.

She sighed. “Again?”

“She just has this way about her, Miss,” the nursemaid said. “One minute there and gone the next. I dunno how she does it.”

Regina slid a piece of parchment into the page of her book and abandoned it on her nightstand. “Where have you looked?”

“She’s not in the kitchens, Miss, or the parlor.”

“Check the stables then, and my father’s game room.”

“Pardon, Miss—the game room?”

“Oh, don’t look so confounded, Sara. Last week we found her in the wine cellar, didn’t we?”

More to the point, Regina had found her in the wine cellar.

“How hard can it be not to lose a two-year-old?” Regina muttered to herself as she prowled the corridors of the manor; Sara and her fellows had taken the first floor, as Rosemary had a sweet tooth and was wont to make a beeline for the kitchen as soon as anyone took their eyes off her for a second. Her efforts were rewarded, as apparently the cook couldn’t resist her big blue eyes and mischievous grin——both of which rankled Regina to no end because they always, always got her what she wanted. Even Cora——Cora!——hadn’t been entirely immune to her charms. Twice Regina had caught her before the fire in the sitting room, murmuring to the child in her lap, Rosemary staring up at her with a wide, wondrous expression. Never suspecting that the woman who held her so tenderly was capable of plucking out her heart and selling it to the highest bidder.

Regina could already see it now, all the days of her life that the princess would be coddled and plumped and pampered, and eventually Regina was going to have to marry this spoiled, naive golden girl whose beauty inspired songs from the poets and a hundred knights to pledge their allegiance.

The servants tended to avoid the second floor, all accept the nursery, for it was where the Mills family had their private chambers, and as far as they knew the third floor was nothing but an attic where seasonal furniture and worthless heirlooms were stored.

Regina called Rosemary’s name softly as she crept up the third story staircase.

And there she was at the top. Of course. Sucking on her fist and grinning devilishly when she saw Regina. There was a tear in her stocking and purple jelly pasted on her mouth. “Hi ‘Gina,” she giggled. “You find me.”

“Found,” Regina muttered, placing one foot on the first step and wincing at the awful creak it caused. “I found you.”

Rosemary looked at her strangely. Regina considered calling one of the nursemaids to come retrieve her, but then Rosemary hauled herself over the top step and crawled out of sight.

“Rosemary,” Regina hissed. “Rosemary, get back here.”

She couldn’t call for help now. No one else was allowed on the third floor. Regina herself needed an invitation and her father preferred to keep his distance. Her mother’s magic was dark, her wrath glacial, and neither was to be trifled with or taken lightly.

As she ascended the rickety staircase, she heard the toddler babbling to herself. The two-year-old terror was a constant source of mischief with no sense of self-preservation, and as her betrothed, Regina was expected to be at least partially invested in her entertainment and whereabouts. Cora insisted she be seen doting on the princess, both in public and in the privacy of their own quarters, where only nursemaids and servants were present——as that was a sure way to guarantee her affections would be reported back to their highnesses.

“Those romantic idiots will give you anything you want if they know you dote on their daughter,” Cora had explained. “It eases their guilt. They hate the idea that they had to sell her off,” she added with a sneer and a glimmer of satisfaction in her eyes.

But it was the summer, and the weather was good, and Regina wanted nothing more than to escape on the wind with her horse into the emerald forests of the Mills’ vast property.

Instead she was stuck on babysitting duty.

The third story was comprised of one short corridor; on one end her father had commissioned a wide, stained glass window, a kaleidescope of glass shipments that had come from all over the realm to suit Henry Sr.’s more artistic inclinations. “It’s so bleak up here,” he’d complained to Regina. He didn’t know the half of it.

The light from this window only extended about halfway down the hall; Regina turned right towards the door at the other end, a sturdy oak with golden hinges that Cora had insisted be installed.

There Rosemary was, somehow having resisted the luminescent light of the stained glass window and chosen instead to plant herself before Cora’s laboratory door.

“Rosemary.”

The girl balanced herself on the doorknob, pudgy knees working overtime as she tried to twist it open. At the sound of Regina’s voice she plopped down, and Regina registered the instant of surprised pain on her face before she started to cry.

“No, no.” Regina ran to the girl’s side and flailed around her, no idea where to place her hands or how to quell a squalling toddler. “Rosemary, be quiet,” she whispered as loud as she dared. She cast a nervous look at the door, but there was no sign of movement on the other side. “Shut up!”

Rosemary clamped her mouth shut and stared up at Regina with wide, round blue eyes, and for a moment Regina could see what all the fuss was about, the girl’s crocodile tears framing her face so pathetically she had the urge to pick her up and dab her cheeks dry and soothe all her sorrow. But then the girl frowned indignantly. “No yelling at Ro-mary,” she declared in a voice far too royal and ringing for anyone but a princess to muster.

“I’m not yell—”

She didn’t get to finish chastising the girl because suddenly Rosemary shimmered, the lines of her body wavering, turquoise and blue and gold, before she just…disappeared.

Regina stared down at where the girl had been, but her eyes hadn’t deceived her. Rosemary was…gone. Blinked away into thin air, leaving the very specific aftertaste of magic in the swirling dust-motes of the corridor.

Regina groaned. She was in for it now. If there was any way of more thoroughly losing a princess than to have her vanish right before your very eyes…well. She didn’t want to know it.

“Rosemary?” she called. Then, more firmly, “Rosemary, you get back here right now.”

The door to her mother’s laboratory shunted open and for a second she was terrified Cora had heard them loitering outside.

It was Rosemary, hands braced on the doorknob, peering at her from the inside of the room. “’Gina,” she bubbled with an awfully proud grin on her face.

Footsteps echoed on the stairs behind them. Now that had to be Cora. Before Regina could shove Rosemary into the laboratory and find a place to hide, her mother appeared at the other end of the hall, muttering to herself as she turned the parchment pages of a heavily bound book. She paused. Then peered over her spectacles.

Regina jumped to attention, flattening herself against the wall. “I didn’t, Mother!” she burst. “It was Rosemary.”

Cora raised an eyebrow. She studied the door, now wide open, the princess balanced against the doorknob looking pleased with herself. “A two-year-old broke into my sealed laboratory.”

“She didn’t…break in, exactly. One second she was outside and then there were these lights and then she was gone and…”

Cora wasn’t paying attention to her anymore. She was sniffing the air, a curious expression on her face. Then she nodded to herself, and swept past Regina into the lab.

Regina was left stunned, bracing for a strike that hadn’t come. All the adrenaline gushed out of her body and she sagged against the wall.

When she looked down, Rosemary was gone again. “Oh, for crying out loud.”

“In here, dear,” Cora called.

Regina stepped cautiously into the room. The last time she’d been inside, Cora had tried to teach her how to levitate a paper weight. Regina, try as she might, had never shown an inclination towards magic, and she’d been cast out of the room by her frazzled, frustrated mother. Get out…Get out, get out…Whole afternoon, wasted. Go study with your father, I suppose. Should’ve known you’d never amount to more than his frivolous fictions and philosophies.

Truth be told, Regina preferred her father’s study, where she was allowed access to his entire collection of histories and biographies, novels, books on political theory and philosophy. He regaled her with tales of his years in university, painting a picture of cavalier freedom and frivolity. Nights in the taverns debating life and the world and everything with complete strangers for the fun of it—the fun of it—their arguments and ideas growing increasingly more ridiculous as they got increasingly drunker. Her mother was right——he was a scholar of the soft and social sciences. And Regina adored him for it.

Rosemary had crawled under a table lined with several unsavory potions’ ingredients. Cora sat at her griffin-clawed desk, illuminated by a magic-fueled candlestick floating above her head, writing notes in her careful, drawn-out handwriting.

“Rosemary,” Regina grit.

“Regina,” Cora greeted her without looking up. “I don’t recall requesting company this afternoon.”

Regina was too indignant to fear her mother’s chilly tone. “Tell that to the princess,” she said. “How did she even get in here?”

“She has magic, dear,” Cora sighed. “Powerful, at that. She’s the child of true love.”

Regina stared down at the toddler. Rosemary grinned with all the satisfaction of a child caught in the cookie jar and stretched her chubby hands towards Regina. “Up.”

Cora glared at them over her spectacles. “Do get her out of here, dear. Before she starts meddling with my magic.”

Regina had no choice then, but to hoist Rosemary up on her hip.

“Thanks a lot,” she muttered as soon as they re-emerged in the corridor and Cora was out of earshot.

Rosemary stuck her thumb in her mouth and leaned her head on Regina’s shoulder.

“Do toddlers understand sarcasm, you think?” a voice said.

Regina looked up; her father waited for them at the top of the staircase with a gentle, amused expression on his face.

“She’s smarter than she looks,” she insisted. “She broke into Mother’s lair.”

“Laboratory,” her father murmured, correcting her on reflex. “And did she now?” Rosemary reached for him. “Aren’t you a clever girl?” he cooed as he took her in his arms.

Regina rolled her eyes. “I’ve broken into Mother’s lab plenty of times. No one ever called me clever.”

Her father ruffled her hair as he guided her back down to the second story. “You are old enough to know better.”

“How’d you know where we were, anyway?” Regina asked, annoyed with her father for defending the princess but comforted by his large, warm hand on her shoulder.

“One of the nursemaids found me,” her father explained. “They’re in a bit of a tizzy since this one’s made her second jailbreak of the week.” He tickled Rosemary’s tummy and she shrieked, squirming against his shoulder but making no attempt to escape his arms; Regina knew the large, heavy comfort of them, their warmth in cold, foreign places. For the first time she wondered if Rosemary understood why her parents had left her here in this lonely old manor with these strangers, or that they had every intention of returning for her. Maybe she didn’t even remember them.

“Do you think she’s looking for her parents?” she asked. “You know, when she sneaks out of the nursery?”

Her father glanced at her with a fond gleam in his eyes. “Now there’s an idea,” he said in the pleased tone he used when she had struck upon something insightful.

In a moment his attention was elsewhere though, as Rosemary pried at the gleaming brass buttons on his shirt. “Oh no, you don’t,” he chuckled.

Even her father, her best love and confidante, was smitten.

He must have understood the look on her face because he said, “It’s a fine match, darling. And it would have been somebody, someday. At least this way, by the time you are wed, you’ll be familiar with each other. It won’t be so much like marrying a stranger. That’s more than most brides would dare to ask.”

“You married for love,” Regina muttered as she followed him down the corridor to his study, passing vast tapestries in rich colors of far-away, imagined lands, and the bust of an ancestor that looked none too pleased for having his likeness cast in stone.

“We did,” her father said when she thought he had forgotten. “And we were happy for a time.” They had reached his study and it opened to the warm, homely smell of books and leather and cigars. Regina sank in her usual armchair, where she had passed many an hour with one of her father’s volumes, calling out to him when she came to an unfamiliar word or turn of phrase, or just wanted to hear his voice extrapolate on the characters that peopled the story, or its rich historical allusions, or cultural relevance.

Her father settled himself in his own chair behind the dark, smooth oak desk, Rosemary still in his arms.

“You could be happy again,” Regina said in a small voice. She curled her knees up to her chin.

Her father bounced Rosemary on his knee when she started to squirm. “Perhaps. But more than anything else, what your mother and I want is for you to be happy. I’m afraid we’ve set a bad example for you, giving you this notion that to marry for love is some noble ideal. But being queen, Regina. That is noble too.”

“I don’t want to be queen.”

“You would rather be wife to some petty lord with few lands or prospects?”

Regina scoffed. “I’d rather not be wife at all.”

“Regina. Your mother has lofty dreams for you. I know—”

“Why are you taking her side?” Regina demanded. She uncurled her legs and pinched her arms together.

Her father’s brow quivered; she’d hurt him.

Rosemary cooed and fussed. He found a piece of hard candy in the drawer of his desk and gave it to her to suck. Regina remembered vaguely being that small and sitting on his lap in this same room, eating candy her mother would have forbidden while her father worked long afternoon hours balancing their accounts.

“There aren’t any sides, my love,” he sighed at last. “There’s only us, your mother and father, who love you and want you to have your best chance in this world.”

Something horrible occurred to Regina. “Was this all your idea?”

He met her eyes in surprise. “Oh, goodness, no. I’m not the plotting sort, you know that. Your mother has always been the one with schemes in her head. And then the magic…”

They winced.

“The magic gave her power to see them through,” her father finished.

“She didn’t have to use magic for this.”

He smiled sadly. “No. Her natural powers of persuasion were enough this time.”

Then Regina asked a question she had never dared ask before. But without even her father’s support, she had nothing to lose. She didn’t loathe the princess anymore; she was resigned and tired of dreading the future. There was a queer nothingness in her chest. “What was she like…Mother…before?”

Her father chuckled, a wisp of melancholy clouding the sound she so adored. “Much the same. Passionate. Clever. Full of ambition. Knew how to get what she wanted. Of course, at the time, what she wanted was to marry me.”

Regina smiled tentatively. She had never actually heard the story of her parents’ courtship. Only that the match had been made for love, and before Cora had any trace of magic.

“We balanced each other,” her father mused. “I had no interest in her lofty dreams. I suppose she was my dream. Her and this house and this land. You.” A fond smile. “That was enough. Once, I’d been able to convince her of that, too.”

The rest was left unsaid. Regina knew this story. Riding home from the capitol many years ago, Cora had been forcibly stopped on the road by a dark sorcerer, who at first was intent on stealing her soul. But by the end of their meeting, Cora, her clever, brilliant mother, had the man eating out of her hand, making her promises of magic and power.

Regina couldn’t remember the woman her father spoke of, who’d been fierce and clever but not cold and single-mindedly greedy for more than her station in life had given her.

“Why don’t you read this little one a story while I get some work done,” her father suggested. She curled her lip. Maybe she didn’t resent the princess anymore, but she didn’t want to spend one second longer in her presence than she had to.

Her father rolled his eyes. “Oh, come now, don’t be ridiculous. Sometimes you really are quite like your mother, you know. Stubborn to the last.”

A war of pleasure and hatred mixed in Regina, to be compared to her mother. She sighed and reached for the girl, whose face glowed like she’d been given a gift. “’Gina please.”

Regina hefted the toddler up into the bend of her arm. “OK, but I’m choosing the book.”

Her father gestured to the stacks. “At your leisure,” he said with a twinkle in his eye.

She found a book she liked, but which also made her unbearably sad. She liked the sadness you got from books. It was real but not real. A safe sort of sadness.

The armchair in the corner was big enough for both of them. Rosemary clambered up after Regina. She stuck her fist in her mouth and rested her head on Regina’s shoulder. Regina smelled her baby smell, soft and clean. Her hair was feather-light. The only other person who ever touched her like this, tenderly, was her father. She tried not to like it. She tried very, very hard. Because if she liked it that would make it harder to hate Rosemary. And she needed to go on hating Rosemary, because otherwise she might start getting accustomed to her, and the idea of her, and a future where they were queens together. Regina didn’t want to be a queen. She only wanted to be on her horse, or hunting with her father, or maybe, just maybe, someday falling in love for real.

She opened the book and began to read.

_Once upon a time, a little princess lived in a house made of stone, and a roof of thatch. She lived all alone with a sheep and a rose on a small patch of grass in the middle of the forest. She had sheeps’ wool to keep her warm in the winters, and the rose, who loved to talk, to keep her company._

_But her sheep was very greedy and liked to eat the petals off the rose. This made the rose grow smaller, and always afraid. The princess tried to keep the sheep away from the rose, but the princess had to sleep, and so could not always keep watch. She did not blame the sheep, for it was only a sheep and that was its nature. Besides, the sheep also did a lot of good by eating the weeds which in turn would have stifled the rose._

_“I will be devoured!” cried the rose._

_“Bahhh,” said the sheep._

_The princess loved the sheep. But she also loved the rose. She wanted them all to be happy. So one day she lifted the sheep, who was small enough for her to carry, into her arms and set off into the woods. She searched a long time for a suitable sheep-friendly valley. She had to leave her realm and cross over into another. She was gone for a long time, and her arms grew weary, but she feared if she put the sheep down it would run off, back to their garden, the only home it had ever known._

_Eventually she crossed into a realm with a sheep-herd who obviously cared very much for his sheep. He nodded his shaggy head when the princess made her offering, and in return gave her some planks of wood for building. Though the princess cried when she had to embrace her sheep for the last time, she was happy to see it frolicking among the other sheep, happily eating the petals off flowers that did not talk and need not worry about being eaten, for they had no souls in this realm, the way her rose did in theirs. So though she was sad, she was also happy as she stepped off and journeyed back to her home._

_But when she arrived, she discovered something awful. In her absence, and the absence of the sheep, weeds had overtaken her tiny garden and therefore the rose. Her beautiful, shy, precious rose, who was crying when the princess finally dug her out from the weeds. The rose stretched towards her. “Where have you been?” she cried._

_“I’m sorry,” said the princess. “I was trying to protect you.”_

_“How can you protect me when this realm is ravaged by weeds?!”_

_The princess was hurt that the rose could not see that she had been trying to do something good, but she loved the rose so she set about cleaning the garden, using a rake to scrape back all the weeds and toss them into the woods. She used the wood from the sheep-herd to build a little fence around her rose. But weeds burrowed deep, and they found their way under. They grew faster than the princess could pull them up. The rose was suffocating, not only above ground, but from the roots under the dirt. The princess and the rose sat one night, crying until the sun rose in gorgeous pinks and splashes of orange._

_Then the princess dug up the rose with her hands, cradling her in a patch of wet soil, and set off once again to find her rose a home that would be safe._

_She journeyed in the opposite direction she had taken the sheep, to be safe, and finally found a realm that contained vast, beautiful gardens. The rose did not want to stay. “Here I will just be one of many. In your garden I am special because I am the only one of my kind.”_

_The princess petted her petals. “But here you will be safe. And you will have friends of your own species,” she added sadly. Besides the goatherd, she had not met many people in her travels._

_At first the rose was reluctant, but the princess implored her just to try for one day. She planted the rose shallowly in a patch of open dirt, and then, exhausted from the long journey, lay down and fell asleep._

_She awoke to voices. She looked around and saw her rose chatting merrily with a marigold on one side and a daffodil on the other. A weeping willow with a booming voice sometimes interjected as well. They all laughed and talked over each other in their excitement, and none of them seemed to mind._

_The princess decided it was best to leave before her rose could see her. Their goodbyes would only be sad, and besides, they had already said their goodbyes, that morning when they had watched the sun come up. She would have to refuse if her rose pleaded to come back with her. And it would hurt too much if her rose didn’t want to come back. The rose hadn’t known what she was missing before, but now she had friends of her own kind and a garden with no sheep, and the weeds kept to themselves, in another part of the garden, so she could be safe._

_The princess returned home to her own quiet garden. She raked the weeds but there was nothing to feed them anymore so one by one they withered and did not come back. She sat and watched the sun rise alone. She thought of her sheep and her rose, no longer her sheep or her rose. A sheep and a rose. She wondered if they thought of her sometimes. She remembered them as she had seen them, happy and safe, and this made her heart warm, and helped her be at peace that she had had to sacrifice her own happiness for theirs. If they were happy, then it was worth it. She could close her eyes and imagine them in their new homes and joy flared in her chest. So really, although she was lonely, she was happy too, that she had let them go._

_With nothing left for her in this place, no rose or sheep or even weeds, she stepped out of the garden one last time, and set off into the trees_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> once upon a time i had a story idea that was supposed to be a quick little 10k word oneshot
> 
> Aaaand then this happened
> 
> Also, the story Regina reads at the end of this chapter is original but inspired by The Little Prince
> 
> Tumblr is: lesbian-revolt.tumblr.com


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok here’s the thing friends. I never intended to write a novel-length submission for this event, but that’s what happened. I wrote this story in a feverish flurry of hours-long writing sessions in an attempt to have a complete draft by the time of the deadline. 
> 
> As such, there are...an insane amount of typos, plot holes and inconsistencies. I know that they’re there. I know where a lot of them are. I also just really do not have the time nor desire to go through the whole story and fix them right now. I’ve been eating, sleeping and dreaming this story for four months. I need a heckin’ break. 
> 
> I fully intend to return to this fic at some point in the future and revise it properly, multiple times, and then possibly repost it.
> 
> In the meantime, I’m sorry if any of my silly errors cause confusion. I really do appreciate everyone who has read and commented on this fic, it means the world to me and I’m sorry I couldn’t give you a product that wasn’t quite so first-drafty. It irks me a thousand times more than it does you, I promise lol

The last time Regina saw Princess Rosemary, her little face was drawn, her arms and knees slightly gaunt, and there was a worried look in her eyes that belied a maturity far beyond her four years.

It was the winter of Regina’s eleventh year, and she was tall and gainly herself, but with none of the sickly pallor.

Food across the kingdom was still scarce; the Mills’ vast lands were the final oasis of fertility, and even their resources were running thin. Other villages had long exhausted their emergency stores of grain and rice, and still the queen and her advisers did not question why the Mills’ fields could continue to sow such prosperous seed. “They expect everyone to be as honest and noble as they are,” Cora had smirked once in the parlor during a late night tea. Henry had kept his eyes fastidiously on his book; Regina was forced to pay attention to her mother’s lecture.

Regina suspected her mother was slipping her some sort of potion in her drinks, because she was starting to forget too, the reason for the mass starvation, the streets of the capitol far away, lined with dying, emaciated bodies. There were hazy gaps in her memories when she tried to recall certain events of her childhood that she could swear had been relevant to all of this.

The world certainly didn’t seem to regard as a child anymore, especially when she had access to a full pantry when most did not. She caught the guards often giving her looks of either appraisal or deep discontent. She wondered if they were considering what the ransom would amount to if the little lord’s daughter was spirited off somewhere and mysteriously returned once the money exchanged hands. She knew her father would pay whatever it took. Her mother as well. Like Rosemary, she was insurance.

One chill night, they stood on the steps of the manor and watched two twinkling lights prance closer and closer from far down the road. The lanterns on the carriage illuminated the two black geldings who bore it, and the simplicity of the wooden cart itself; no dashing designs or gold-gilded edges that would have more befitted a princess. But that was the point, of course. No one would ever suspect the simple carriage was transporting a little royal inside, skulking from safe house to safe house in the dead of night until finally they reached the border of Cora’s protection wards.

“This is what happens when you make deals with queens who think they’ve been plucked right out of a fairytale,” she muttered under her breath. Regina kept her mouth shut and didn’t point out that Cora hadn’t always been entirely truthful with the queen herself.

Her mother was in a particularly sour mood these days and, just like everything else in Regina’s life, it seemed, it had to do with Rosemary.

Cora had received the correspondence in their sitting room a week earlier. She had read it without expression, then tossed it to the ground. Her face was a mask of ice. “That lying, sniveling child we call our queen, it seems, has withheld certain…items of information from us.”

A servant dashed forward to collect the parchment on the floor but Cora had waved her away.

“Leave us.”

Once they were alone, she gestured for Regina to pick up the letter.

“It would seem, dear one,” she crooned, brushing her fingertips across Regina’s cheek and sweeping back her hair. “That our princess was promised to another before you. Which Our Highness so forgetfully neglected to mention before stripping our fields to the bone. And for what?” she spat in scorn, taking the letter from Regina and lighting a spark of violet fire underneath it. She held it as the edges scorched and curled, her fingers remaining unscathed. “We, my dear one, have been played for fools,” she husked. “The princess is owed to the Dark One, that twisted, conniving little man, and he has come to collect his debt.”  
  
Regina’s heart pounded as she came to understand what her mother was saying. The fiery look of vengeance brewing on her mother’s face sent a stone of dread into her stomach.

“Why—” she began.

“Because,” Cora snapped. “Those fools thought they could find another way, another price, or simply escape their fate altogether, if they sank their heads in the sand long enough. Just a dream, just a nightmare. But you don’t break deals with the Dark One,” she sneered.

“Why?” Regina whispered again, her face a pale sheet of ice.

“Why do we ever bargain with the devil? For love, for power. For the life of that Charming little husband of hers. His father was a tyrant. I’m sure she thought once she had the throne she would have enough money and power and influence to convince the Dark One to take something else. But he has no use for such things. He wants the souls he is due.”

A second correspondence came over breakfast, which Regina read in disbelief. “They want to send her here,” she blurted the moment her mother sat down and cracked her boiled egg.

Cora paused. “Who?” she asked coldly, though Regina suspected she already knew.

“Rosemary.”

Cora had disappeared into her chambers for the rest of the morning. That night, she directed Regina to practice her penmanship by drafting a letter to the queen, stating that they would acquiesce to the request and keep the princess under their protection while the royals found a way to satisfy the Dark One.

“Not that they will,” Cora scoffed.

Regina paused with her pen in the ink.

“Don’t write that,” Cora snapped. “Obviously. It’s done, send for the messenger.”

Regina wondered what exactly her mother had in mind, bringing the princess here. It couldn’t be as simple as all that. Her mother did not take kindly to being toyed with. There had to be something else going on, though Regina for the life of her couldn’t imagine what it was.

The carriage drew closer, flanked by two guards on horseback. It circled the yard and came to a stop in front of the entrance; the horses puffed ice from their nostrils, their flanks dark with sweat.

First a pudgy older woman emerged, gripping a shawl around her shoulders. She ducked her upper body back into the carriage and seemed to murmur softly to someone; finally she managed to coax the blonde girl into the open. She was gaunter than Regina had expected, bruised circles under her eyes. And pale, sickly pale. She nuzzled into her nursemaid, who hefted her up against her chest. The princess had just celebrated her fourth year. She sighed tiredly when prompted to greet her hosts. The nursemaid smiled apologetically. “Long ride, you know.”

The princess had been stolen away from the palace in the dead of night, checking in at safe houses and stopping only once at a shoddy inn for fresh horses, in an attempt to elude the Dark One and his spies. They had been on the road two and a half days. The nursemaid creaked stiffly but still managed to make it up the stairs to the front door of the manor, and then up both spiral staircases to the chambers that had once served as Regina’s own nursery. They occupied most of the second floor, composed of all the sorts of things a child could dream of wanting, a playroom and toys, games, puzzles, a loft bed that Regina had begged her father to have built for her when she reached her third birthday.

The nursemaid stared at the high bed, then at the sleeping girl in her arms; Regina sighed and led her into another room with a crib that just managed to contain the princess’s growing body. A fourth room was set up for the nursemaid herself, who thanked Regina and sent her to bed.

Regina paused before she left the nursery. She stared at Rosemary, who was curled in a tiny ball, head rested on her hands. She looked restless in sleep; she murmured and shifted several times as Regina stood there watching her.

Regina had been trying lately, very hard, not to hate her. She had mostly dispensed of all that, but sometimes it still cropped up in her, the utter repulsion she had for the girl whose very existence had set her fate and ruined her life. It wasn’t fair to hate the little girl in the crib, who hadn’t ever done anything to her but be born. All the same, Regina’s anger and despair had somehow funneled into this intense, singular feeling towards the princess.

Rosemary moaned softly. Regina saw dried tear tracks on her face. She tried to muster up the empathy she’d have for any other child who’d been ripped from their home under the threat of death, or whatever it was that happened when a sorcerer stole your heart. Regina couldn’t make any sense of all the feelings inside of her. It was too big. There was too much. It was a hard knot in her chest that sat there all the time.

Rosemary lifted herself onto one elbow and looked around with blurry eyes, trying to orient herself in the dark. “Bessa?” she called softly.

She was looking for her nursemaid. Regina said, “I’m here.”

“Are we there yet?” Rosie asked, rubbing her face as her head returned to the pillow.

“Yes, Rosemary,” Regina replied, staring through the dark at her princess. “You’re there.”

((()))

Cora was less patient with Regina’s flights of fancy these days, and always seemed to know when Regina had been off on Rocinante instead of practicing her etiquette or, more importantly, studying the twisted patterns of political history that haunted the kingdom, from steadfast alliances to ancient rivalries, to backstabbing lords and scheming ladies; it was a shock to Regina the day she realized that her family most assuredly belonged to the latter category.

She found the opportunities anyway, slipping from the manor before her mother, who kept long midnight hours, emerged from her chambers.

“Go away,” she said to Rosemary as she stalked across the stable grounds. She peeked back. Rosemary pretended not to be looking at her. Her thin little body and stringy blond hair lacked the luster of past years, and in this case, it had nothing to do with the famine; half the kingdom would starve——willingly, probably——if it meant Princess Rosemary retained her rosy cheeks and plump baby fat. The golden girl was adored by the common people, and it didn’t matter what unrest swept across the kingdom, most everyone was in agreement that Rosemary’s birth and reign would bring prosperity and vigor back to the land.

Regina was dismayed to find she lived in a kingdom of idiots.

“’Gina, wait!” Rosemary cried as Regina tried to close the stable doors behind her. Regina grunted, knowing there was no way to pretend she hadn’t heard, not with half the stable-hands watching from the corner of their eyes.

“Go back inside Rosemary,” she muttered, sweeping back her riding skirts (which had been a compromise for her mother’s sake, since Regina would have much preferred britches).

“Let me come ‘Gina, this time, please?”

“You can’t ride,” Regina pointed out.

Rosemary bunched her fists and screwed up her nose. “I can ride! Joseph taught me!”

“Fine,” Regina huffed. “I mean, you can’t ride as well as I can. We’ll barely get out of the yard if I have to sit around waiting for your fat pony to catch up to Rocinante.”

“He’s not fat!” Rosemary cried, rushing to her piebald pony’s stall and petting his pink-tinged nose. She fished in her pockets for sugar cubes she’d stolen from the dish at breakfast.

“Keep feeding him like that and he will be,” Regina muttered as she swung the harness over Rocinante’s good-natured head and led him from his stall.

She tied him up and first set about changing his hay, a job she insisted on doing despite the stable hands’ horror whenever they saw their lady shovel horse-shit out of the barn. But Regina had been taught by her father, a true horseman to the last, and a real horseman looked after their own steed. Besides, Regina liked the drudgery of the work, her firm grip around the pitchfork, the steady rhythm of the lift and toss of dirty hay. Rocinante swished his tail against the flies and wacked her cheek a few times, making her giggle.

She emerged from the stall sweaty but satisfied to find Rosemary trying valiantly to copy her across the way in her own piebald’s stall. Regina rolled her eyes as Rosemary tried to drag a full sized pitchfork across the floor, picking up a few wispy strands of hay but missing the manure by a mile and leaving Rosemary panting. The pitchfork dropped to the ground in a clatter of metal. A stable hand, ever on deck to jump to assistance, ran down the aisle.

“It’s fine,” Regina snapped. “Just Rosemary.” Being an idiot.

“Let me, Princess,” the stable hand said, ducking his head. He was little more than a boy himself. Regina thought he might be the son of one of the house-servants.

Rosemary glared at the fallen pitchfork and a bubble of tears erupted from her eyes, which she tried with all her little might to hold back.

“Never mind,” Regina said to the stableboy, coming up behind them. “Would you go fetch me Rocinante’s martingale and bridle?”

“Not his saddle, Miss?”

Regina shook her head, eyes on Rosemary. “Not today.”

“As you wish.” The stable boy bowed his head once more to Rosemary, who could hardly have understood the significance of the gesture——though she was bowed to so often she probably thought it perfectly normal for others to defer to her every whim as she went about her day without a care in the world.

“Come here,” Regina grunted, entering the stall and grabbing Rosemary’s abandoned pitchfork. “You’re too short,” she said. “You have to go like this, and press down.” She demonstrated a trick her father had taught her when she was too little to handle farm tools on her own, and in a moment Rosemary had scrunched up her temple in determination and taken over with a clumsy wiggle of her legs as she worked to balance the handle against her body while sweeping dirty straw and muck from the stall.

The stable boy returned with Rocinante’s bridle and martingale and Regina thanked him before he could put them on himself. She palmed the supple leather and dipped it over her chestnut’s strong, proud head. He accepted the bit willingly. Leaving him tethered, she returned to his stall and removed a loose board at the back, revealing an emergency pair of britches for days when her mother was in a bitter temper and vetoed Regina’s choice of riding gear.

She changed behind the gate in a single fluid motion belying years of practice and then returned Rosemary’s piebald, Piper, to his stall.

Rosemary stared between Regina and her pony, looking crestfallen.

“Well,” Regina said. “Come on then.” She led Rocinante to the mounting block and he stood patiently.

“Really?” Rosemary asked, eyes alight. When she gazed in wonder like that, Regina could understand why the people loved her, their little miracle child, though she still thought them fools for believing a child could, by her existence alone, end a years-old famine.

“Hurry up before I change my mind.”

Rosemary scrambled to the edge of the mounting block. She rested her hands on Rocinante’s flank. He snorted.

Regina sighed and climbed up beside her. “Arms up,” she said, and lifted the girl by her armpits onto the back of the horse. “Scoot forward,” she directed, and when Rosemary was nearly perching on the horse’s neck, Regina threw her leg over and settled comfortably in the dip of her stallion’s back. She took the reins in such a way that her arms made a cradle for Rosemary’s body. She clicked her tongue and Rocinante set off at a walk, hardly a brisk pace, but Rosemary yelped as the big horse’s gait swayed them side to side.

Regina laughed. “I told you it’s not like a pony.”

“Don’t let go,” Rosemary said. Her hands clutched the base of Rocinante’s chestnut mane.

“Don’t pull so hard,” Regina said. “You’re holding too tight.”

She pried Rosemary’s fingers from the thick hairs of Rocinante’s mane as he sauntered out of the stable yard.

They came to a dirt road with three forks; one circled around to the front of the manor and led off the property onto the main road; the other, a sharp left turn, would take them past her father’s livestock, pigs and chickens and goats and such, and on to the vast plantations where nothing grew during the cold season.

She nudged Rocinante’s sides with her heels and directed him down the third option; this road sandwiched them between pastures of cattle and horses, and the wooded trails that kept within Cora’s magical boundaries but were out of sight of the manor. These provided the illusion of freedom, which was as close as Regina was going to get.

Regina nudged Rocinante into a trot and Rosemary squealed. “Too fast!”

“You’re fine,” Regina insisted; her arms were secure around the princess. She nudged with her heels again, balancing expertly with her legs as Rocinante kicked into a canter, a smoother gait than the trot, and only then did she feel some tension ease from Rosemary’s shoulders.

They turned off the lane and onto a deer path nearly hidden by trees and brush. But Rocinante knew the way and Regina hardly had to direct him as he loped through the shining, sunlit woods. The air created a funnel of cold wind around their faces; the bare trees shook and rattled. Regina welcomed the numbness that came to her face, and the brisk temperature that froze the tips of her ears and fingers. But her shoulders and legs were covered in sweat by the time she eased Rocinante out of his gallop; such came with the effort of riding bareback.

Rosemary’s hair was windswept; wisps of yellow flew into Regina’s face. She blew a strand out of her mouth and away from her nose. She tried to remember that this girl was her shackle, her ball and chain. But it was hard to see her that way at that moment. She was too soft and her limbs were bright pink and a shiver that might have been cold or excitement ran down her spine. Regina could make her a friend, if she wanted to. She didn’t consider herself the lonesome sort, not with her father as confidante and Rocinante as companion, but there was something about the girl resting against her chest. The juxtaposition of her warm body and freezing fingers and nose. The way she felt so very alive. All Regina felt was numb, all the time.

Balance. An even distribution of weight.

Equilibrium. A symmetry of two opposite influences.

Her father’s definition; two opposing forces finding a center before they can destroy one another.

A wave of nausea hit her. She pulled Rocinante to a halt, ignoring Rosemary’s surprised cry as she slid off his back to dry heave in some bushes. Her throat constricted and her belly clenched, except nothing but saliva dribbled out.

When she looked up a few moments later, Rocinante was plucking at some grass on the side of the trail and Rosemary had dismounted. The princess was watching her. Regina wiped her mouth.

“Are you OK?” Rosemary asked quietly.

Regina shrugged and brushed past her, retrieving a handkerchief from the saddle bag and rubbing the sweat from her face before it gave her a chill. “Come on,” she said, wishing she was alone, realizing how stupid it had been to bring the princess out of…what? Duty? Pity? Compassion? Some misplaced hope of kinship?

Back on the trail she kicked Rocinante into a hard gallop, Rosemary again perched in front of her, Regina trying desperately to forget that the princess was there. Focus on the wind and the rush and the cold, cold, cold.

Rosemary. Stupid, innocent Rosemary, still with her baby fat and sweetness and not understanding any of it, that her fate was sealed, her life forfeit. Did she even know that she’d been sold?

She pushed Rocinante harder; Rosemary cried out as the trees blurred on every side. The trail led up a rocky incline and the brush began to thin, until the woods opened out onto a view of rolling hills. The land was unfit for farming or it would have been tilled and planted long ago, but it suited Regina just fine as she sent Rocinante flying across the pebbled ground. She heard high-pitched whimpering. Regina clucked again to the horse, hoping somehow that she could escape that helpless, pitiful sound.

It wasn’t until she heard Rosemary sobbing in terror that she considered maybe that she had gone too far. She began to pull back on the reins but Rocinante, high off the freedom of the wind in his mane, resisted her urge.

“Whoaaa,” she cried, sitting low on his rump and again tugging the reins, only to discover to her horror that he had the bit in his mouth and full control of his head, which he reared back joyfully as he kicked his hind legs into the air.

Alone, Regina would have managed to stay astride him, but Rosie’s stubby legs were too short to keep Rocinante’s flank in a firm grip. Regina, focused on regaining control of the reins, only felt the slightest slip before the body in front of her was gone. She gritted her teeth and latched onto the straps of the bridle, knocking the bit back into his mouth and finally convincing him to land on his hooves; he pranced for a moment more, tossing his head back so that she could see the smug expression in his eyes.

“Pleased with yourself, are you?” Regina gasped, trying to catch her breath. When Rocinante was finally still and docile and content to graze on the dry stalks of crab grass that layered the valley, Regina patted his sweat-soaked neck before remembering.

“Rosemary?” She looked around wildly. A flash of blond hair gave her away, and then the magenta of her riding outfit, but as Regina dismounted and looked closer she could see that the lump wasn’t moving.

“Rosemary!” She meant to scream, but it came out a low, guttural choking sound. Coughing, feeling a sob rise in her throat, she stumbled towards Rosemary’s body.

Rosie’s face was pale as death. Her lips were blue. Tears streamed down her face but she made no sound except a keening whine deep in her chest. When she saw Regina, she tried to speak and coughed blood. “No, no, no,” Regina rolled Rosemary onto her back and scanned for damage; when she pressed a hand to Rosemary’s side she moaned, and Regina could actually feel the broken rib under the skin.

“Hold on, hold on,” Regina said, frantically tearing off her own jacket and covering Rosemary’s freezing body. She whistled for Rocinante, who she could barely make out for the tears that clouded her gaze. It was too much. She didn’t know what to do. She wanted her father.

She got her mother.

Cora appeared in a swirl of purple smoke, livid as Regina had ever seen her. Without a word Cora grabbed Regina’s wrist and thrust her towards Rocinante.

“Find your own way back,” she said, low and dark as she stooped to pick up Rosemary in the cradle of her arms. She pierced Regina with her gaze and Regina felt the cold of a wind pass over her that tasted sharply of magic. She lost her breath for a moment, before her mother released her grip. Gasping, Regina turned and fled towards Rocinante.

Hidden against his flank, she heard her mother’s voice.

“One more thing, Regina.”

Regina winced and rested her forehead on her horse’s heaving side.

“If you ever, ever endanger the princess’s life like this again, I will lock you up myself and you will subsist on dog scraps and drain water until the day that you are wed. You will be queen, Regina. Make no mistake of that.”

((()))

After the accident Rosemary was confined to her bed and Regina was regaled with many threats to sell Rocinante for horse meat, which gave her one more reason to swing back on the pendulum of tolerating and hating Princess Rosemary.

They didn’t see each other, which suited Regina just fine; she requested meals be brought to her room and sulked privately rather than face her mother’s disapproval over a roasted ham. Eventually the real meals stopped coming and her mother had the kitchen send lukewarm porridge or rice, but even this couldn’t convince her to emerge. When the texture of porridge sliding down her throat began to make her gag, she reminded herself of the thousands of people who wouldn’t eat that night at all.

She wasn’t allowed out of the grounds——there were wards specifically in place to keep her put——but she heard the servants whispering. The famine was reaching its height; drought had ravaged the land. Civil unrest grew with the knowledge that there were people tucked away in their manors and castles that would never know what it was like to watch their children grow emaciated before their very eyes. So Regina understood; there was a reason for the wards. There was a reason she was not allowed through the gate of the grounds.

There was a reason that a shadowed stranger came in the night and stole the princess Rosemary.

((()))

The queen’s entourage was more heavily guarded than Regina could ever remember. Snow White emerged in tears, Charming on her heels with a look of steel on his face. Regina had always regarded him as something of a dumb oaf, but she could see now why he had been appointed Head of the Guard, and it had nothing to do with nepotism.

The house servants were lined up in the hall and taken one by one for questioning, followed by the stable and field hands. A few admitted to having seen a strange man among their ranks, but had thought nothing of it beyond that he must have been newly hired. But the man was nowhere to be found, and for a few days they were suspected of lying to cover up a more nefarious plot.

Until finally a likeness of the face was drawn up and Cora was able to identify him——a kitchen boy who’d recently been taken on. The butler who had overseen his hire was questioned thoroughly and then promptly fired. Regina had never known him well but on occasion he had spared a kind smile for her. As he was cast through the gates, she wondered if he did or did not still have his heart beating in his chest.

As the days, then weeks, passed, hope of finding the princess grew bleaker. Regina’s feelings on the matter were torn, because she had essentially gotten her wish. She would never have to marry Rosemary or become a queen. The only guilt she harbored was over the fact that Rosemary was practically a baby, and who knew what her kidnapper had in store?

She’d never done anything wrong to Regina, really, but exist, and also almost gotten her horse sold to the butcher, but she didn’t deserve to be stolen from her family. Wherever she was, she had to be confused and terrified and lost, and not old enough to have any idea of how to escape or contact her parents.

Then again, the king and queen had sold her——twice over, once to the Dark One and once to the Mills——so maybe, wherever she was, she was better off (then Regina began to wish that she was the one who’d been kidnapped).

Two months passed; the queen’s guard had scoured the countryside, leaving no village nor remote area of wilderness unscrutinized. The ransom note they’d all been hoping for never appeared, so the culprit couldn’t have been some starving family or embittered ex-patriot. The royals sent a plea across the kingdom, swearing a hefty reward for their child’s safe return. Though Regina, knowing what she knew of their broken promise, doubted their word was worth much.

Nevertheless, she suspected, in this case, they would undoubtedly have given the keys to the kingdom to whoever could bring Rosemary back to them.

“For people who sold her to a sorcerer before she was even born, they want her back awfully bad,” she said to her father one day in his study. She sat at the window seat, staring across the grounds. She hadn’t been allowed past the farmyard since Rosemary had disappeared, though why anyone would consider kidnapping her, Regina had no idea.

Her father swiveled his chair in surprise. “Regina!”

She looked at him innocently. “What?”

Her father shook his head in exasperation and beckoned her. “Come here.” She unfolded her knees and went to sit in his lap, something she had long grown out of. Lately he liked to keep her close, and she knew he was shaken by what had happened.

“I’m right here, Daddy,” she assured him, inhaling the sweet scent of his cigar. It smelled warm. It smelled like home. She kissed his cheek and bounced off his lap, going to scour the shelves for something new to read.

Her father sighed and shook his head. “I imagine you’ve read every book on that shelf,” he said fondly.

She grinned at him. “Well, maybe not every.”

“A new shipment is coming soon. Several prints from the capitol. A Moss, a Ravlant.” He always ordered storybooks for her to go along with his heavy leather-bound texts of mathematics and philosophy. She read those too, but mostly found them a bore. She read them because she liked having something to talk to her father about. He always made the subjects sound much more interesting than the books ever did.

“Regina,” her father called as she scoured the shelves she already knew by heart. She didn’t quite look at him, but tilted her head to show she was listening to the gentle reprimand he was about to give her.

“Rosemary’s parents love her very much.”

Regina looked at him then, and raised an eyebrow in skepticism.

“The choices they made——they made them to save a lot of people.”

“At Rosemary’s expense!”

Her father smiled fondly. “You’re very invested for the girl who never liked her in the first place,” he said.

Regina scoffed. “That has nothing to do with it. It’s the principle of the thing. Besides, I never said I didn’t like her.”

“You’ve done a marvelous job fooling all of us then,” her father said dryly. But still gentle. None of the derision she would have faced from her mother.

“I didn’t not like her. I just didn’t want to marry her,” Regina grit.

Her father’s face fell; an unbearable guilt entered his eyes. Regina turned back to the bookshelf——she couldn’t look. His guilt made no difference. What’s done was done. Too many wheels had been set in motion to change her fate now. Whatever happened, whether Rosemary was found or not, she would always be the girl who’d been meant to be queen. Her mother would try to make something of her yet.

“I’m sorry, Regina,” her father said quietly. “You know that. I didn’t want this for you.”

“It doesn’t matter now,” Regina said, tears pricking her eyes. “I got out of it, didn’t I?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I gotta prepare y’all: first, if you’ve made it this far, thank you!!
> 
> Second, I really didn’t have time to do any revisions or even simple proofreading before I uploaded this. I’m trying my best to read through it and catch as many errors as I can but as some of you have already discovered, there are definitely some typos and inconsistencies with names and such from earlier versions of the story or just from me being a forgetful ninny. I truly appreciate that these have been pointed out to me and am trying to fix everything that I can to avoid confusion!!!


	3. Chapter Three

Everyone said that the Dark One’s wife was just as evil as he, though no one could either confirm or deny this because no one had seen her since the day many years ago when she was conveyed to his Keep by a lavish carriage pulled by four black horses, wearing skirts of ebony and indigo, and an expression as regal as a queen.

Emma wouldn’t have come to the Keep if she wasn’t desperate. But, then, she’d been desperate before. A secret part of her was simply curious about what was hiding in the scraggly black-stone Keep on the top of hill above the village.

She was a bounty hunter. Her job was to find lost things in dark places.

Her friend, Red, had warned her not to come. But Emma had seen the glassy pain in Henry’s eyes and known she had to try. 

Crooks these days were often desperate and spineless, and prison walls were falling into disrepair. Jail breakers came a dime a dozen. Not to mention the thieves and cutthroats who fled from the Enchanted Forest here to Garmir, where the law was less regulated. A wild frontier, of sorts.

Most of them were not so different from Emma, starving kids who’d had a bit of bad luck, and Emma tried not to think about what happened to them after she collected her pay from the queen’s guard ‘and watched them get carted away. It wasn’t her business what they had done or why.

She didn’t care so much about herself——she’d always found a way to get by, somehow or other, but Henry was ill and the tavern was slowly sinking beneath its debts from better days. Red was toying with the idea of turning it into something less above-ground——something that might appeal to those drunken, hopeless men who had few other places to put their coin but down the bottle or in a lady’s brassiere.

Emma’s service was sought after, not the least for the fact that she was human. The Enchanted Forest patrols felt less uneasy doing business with her than with the shape-shifters that Emma had grown up among. Humans such as Emma were well within the minority, and those that lived in Garmir were often refugees or criminals of some kind or another. Or an orphan, babes passed over the border to some unfortunate bastard because there were already too many mouths to feed, and either you sent your child to take its chances with the shape-shifters or you let them starve to death in the streets.

In this way, Emma figured that her parents had at least tried to give her her best chance. She’d probably been the fifth or sixth child, resources already stretched thin in a land torn apart by famine and internal politics. Setting her free was better than watching her die.

There were days in Emma’s childhood when, dirty and cold and sleeping with one eye open against the boys, who’d taken to leering at her because her breasts had started coming in, that she’d wished her parents had given her a sleeping syrup and a slit throat and buried her in the back garden or the edge of the woods under a nice tree, or a plot of ground near whatever poor hovel where they lived. Because that way, at least, her two greatest desires could have been fulfilled; to be with them and to not hurt anymore.

But those were childhood fantasies.

The door to the Keep was made of the blackest wood, which could only be found from the darkest trees at the top of the mountains. He had a flare for aesthetic, this Dark One. Emma had never seen him; he mostly left the denizens of Garmir alone. His interest lay in the humans across the border. She had heard the tales, same as any other child, of stolen hearts and promised babes, deals that ended at the stroke of twelve, and wishes that were never quite what they seemed.

Few in the village below the Keep had actually laid eyes on him, though occasionally his carriage passed through town, windows shrouded by black curtains and shadowy silhouettes. But he was not who she was here to see.

The invitation had been conveyed to her by a messenger from the Keep, a man who did not fraternize with the general village population, as it went with most of the Dark One’s servants. A meeting requested by the witch. That was how she’d signed it. _The Witch_.

Emma didn’t know if she was actually a witch. But that’s what everyone called her.

One of the double doors creaked open before she could raise her hand to grasp the door knocker. A servant, dressed in white all the way from his collar to the tips of his tailcoats, bowed her into the front hall, a wide chamber that was illuminated by floating candles which cast strange shadows on the walls and ceiling. There were no windows.

And yet her arrival had clearly been anticipated. Not for the first time, Emma wondered who was watching her. Somehow she’d earned the attention of The Witch; her reputation had preceded her. _Your services are required at the Keep._

One did not refuse an invitation to the Keep. If they wanted you, they’d find you. The villagers said that the Dark One could appear and disappear in a burst of indigo smoke, traveling between realms in seconds.

_Look at me_, a boy from the orphanage had said once, when she was a child. _I can jump between realms too._ A group of them had been playing near an unmarked section of the border. Everyone knew it was there because a tree on the other side had been scrawled on by humans with messages to the shape-shifters. ‘Freaks’. ‘Monsters’. ‘Not worth the ropes you’ll hang by’. The boy hopped back and forth across the invisible line that separated the two realms. He was shot down by a nearby patrol. The boy had been human, but the Enchanted Forest’s soldiers didn’t ask questions first.

“This way, Miss,” the servant said, ducking his eyes as he led her deeper into the candlelit hall to a flight of steps that wrapped around the tower of the Keep. It was closed in by cold stone walls, and a draft spiraled down as they began to climb. Emma’s breath appeared in puffs of air. Outside the sun shone, the earth was warm. It never became what one could call _hot_ in Garmir. It was too far north. But it was like the Keep was trapped in the depths of winter.

Shivering, she climbed until the staircase branched off into two directions, wide corridors that ran the circumference of the tower.

The servant led her to a black door, almost invisible in the black lava stone. It paralleled another, on the other side of the hall. When she peered further down the corridor, she saw that there were several of these, with a window or two dispersed between them. The sun came through, but cast only cold light on the floor.

“Miss,” the servant murmured.

She positioned herself at attention, fists gripped at her sides, no idea what to expect.

But when the door swung open she found herself in a study. Ordinary, at first glance. Walls with shelves lined with book, the smell of ink and paper. But also strange, oily substances or animal membranes in glass jars.

The servant crossed the threshold and introduced her to someone she could not see.

“Send her in.”

It may have very well been the first time anyone in Garmir had heard The Witch speak. The shape-shifters were a gossipy folk, keen on secrets and mysteries; if there had been a way of snooping on The Witch before now, they would have found it, and the rumors would have spread to the four corners of the kingdom years ago.

But very few rumors flitted around concerning The Witch. The denizens of Garmir were too wary of the Dark One to spread outlandish lies about his wife. Though the bards certainly had no issue writing ballads of the sorcerer’s cruel and twisted daring-dos. The Dark One was fair game, but never his wife.

The servant retreated with a nod to Emma. “Her Lady will see you now,” he said. His coat-tails twirled in the air as he turned and went back to his post.

((()))

“Well?” a voice called when Emma lingered too long outside the door. She examined the threshold, but it looked like an ordinary doorway to her. No tricks or traps waiting for her. Not that she would recognize them if there were.

Taking a deep breath to quell the pounding of her heart, she stepped into the room. The Witch beckoned. Emma took one step closer but would go no further. That was enough. The door slammed behind her; her shoulders jumped.

“I don’t have all day, dear,” The Witch said.

She stared coolly at Emma. Her hair was piled high on her head in rich, complex curls; her eyes were slit like a cat’s, designed to cut through the darkest of nights. She sat on a raised platform behind a grand oak desk, over which were scattered papers and leather-bound volumes, several ink-wells of different colors and a variety of feather pens. These were the objects Emma could identify. There was also a fist-sized globe on a griffin-clawed stand that swirled with indigo clouds. A pint-sized dragon curled up in a glass box, which at first looked only like a replica until you noticed the smoke curling from its nostrils. A pulsing, red lump in a jar that glowed and seemed almost to have a life of its own, despite its containment and shapelessness. Emma did not want to think too hard about why that could be.

The Witch licked her thumb and turned the page of her notebook—a gesture so domestic, which Emma had seen done by Granny or Red a hundred times, that she was shaken from her dull-eyed stupor and was able at last to gain her composure.

She straightened her shoulders and dared to meet The Witch’s eyes. She was younger than Emma had imagined; the Dark One was old as the hills, people said. His wife had not a blemish on her face, and her breasts were gripped by a bodice high on her chest, leaving very little to the imagination. Emma blushed and returned her eyes to the woman’s face.

“If you’re done ogling my things…” The Witch said coolly.

Emma’s gaze jumped back to her face and realized this woman could eat her alive if given reason and opportunity. Really, she wasn’t so different from some of Emma’s shadier clients, the mob bosses and back-alley political influencers that sought her services.

“I’ve just never seen magic like this before,” she admitted, adopting the bold, unapologetic swagger that won over other unsavory characters.

“This?” The Witch laughed. “You think this is magic?” She tapped the glass over the sleeping dragon, who snorted and glared up at her. “This is parlor tricks. I don’t have time to watch you gape like a child who’s never left the borders of this village. I chose you specifically because you are not. But I can just as easily find some other gutter-rat to do my grunt work for me.”

“You chose me?” Emma blurted. She had not thought of it that way. Had not realized she had been culled from a list of others like her.

The woman paused. She looked up at Emma with derision on her face. “Was that unclear from the invitation?” she asked, before returning to the leather volume, scribbling something with a tall peacock pen. Emma hoped it wasn’t have hired a gigantic idiot.

“I mean,” Emma clarified. “You want a contract.”

“A deal,” The Witch said automatically. “But yes.”

“In return for what?”

The Witch gestured towards a burlap sack on the edge of her desk. So far, Emma hadn’t ventured past the lip of the door. But the woman seemed intent on making her cross the room, past the odd contraptions and jars and their squirmy, slimy, oily contents.

She closed her nose and mouth lest some poisonous fumes linger in the air, though the raven-haired woman seemed fine——but witches surely had protection against that sort of thing.

She waited for Emma to reach the edge of the desk and with a wave of her hand produced a chair. “You’re welcome to breathe,” she said dryly as Emma gingerly sat on the hard, straight-backed seat.

She blushed and inhaled tentatively, but when this did not automatically produce dizziness or nausea, she relented and stopped being paranoid. What could she have done about it anyway, if The Witch did wish to poison her? She had made her decision when she’d crossed the threshold of the Keep.

Then she coughed and her throat swelled; her eyes widened as a heavy, smoky something tingled in her throat. The Witch raised her eyebrow; she rested her elbows on the table and laced her long, elegant fingers together. “There’s no need for the dramatics, Miss—,” she paused.

“Emma,” Emma coughed.

“Emma what?”

“Swan. Emma Swan.” Emma gagged.

The Witch sighed and resumed gliding the iridescent peacock pen across parchment. “Emma,” she said, drawling the ‘o’. “When you’re quite done, I’d like to discuss the terms of your employment. I have no intention of killing you; I want you to work for me.”

“What’d ya put in the air, then?” Emma croaked, rubbing the sting in her chest.

This brought The Witch pause; she set down her pen and studied Emma from the crown of her head down to her hands, which had started to shake. “Interesting,” she murmured. “Very interesting. This could be more lucrative than I’d imagined.”

Emma coughed. Her eyes started to smart. “Mind sharing?”

The Witch cocked her head, as though she was thinking. Emma was beginning to wonder if her exaggerated mannerisms were intentional, a way of taking up more space than her body actually did. Her dress and shawl were made of rich black satin that glinted purple in the sun rays coming through the window——funny, Emma had not expected the sun to shine here——and though she had a tall and regal bearing, her frame was actually quite average. One might even say petite.

“Wha—?”

“Just a moment,” The Witch said, perching her chin on the top of her folded hands. Her eyes glinted in interest as Emma continued to sit there, struggling to breathe. But instead of growing faint, she started to feel the stinging sensation ease in her chest. Spots danced in her vision and then cleared. She heaved in a gasp; in her throat she could still feel the same contents of the air, but it was as if her body had grown used to them suddenly, and her breathing slowed.

The Witch nodded. “Very interesting.”

Emma had the were-withal to glare at her, then pondered the wisdom of glaring at witches.

“You are more sensitive to magic than most, it would seem,” The Witch said. “Most people would enter this room without feeling anything. Without even a wisp of the reaction you’ve just experienced.”

Emma rubbed her chest, which ached from the effort of breathing. “Is that a bad thing?”

The Witch shrugged and returned to her work as though she had lost interest. “Some would say so. Others would say it is a gift.”

“What do you say?”

The Witch stared at her over her spectacles for a moment, then her brow furrowed slowly, as though she had just remembered it was she who was meant to be dictating this conversation. “What I say on the matter is of no consequence,” she said briskly at last. “What you do with the knowledge makes no difference to me. It’s not as though you could be capable of using magic.” She half-sneered. “I brought you here because I was told you were a bounty hunter. Unless my sources were mistaken?”

Based on her expression, Emma was afraid to know what would have happened to her sources if they had been mistaken. She shook her head. “They’re right.”

“Mm. Good.” The Witch nodded. “Then consider this a business transaction.”

With the tip of her pen she nudged the burlap sack towards Emma. It was hefty; Emma needed both hands to lift it. Her heart started pounding again, this time in excitement as her fingers recognized the sensation of its contents through the fabric. She looked at The Witch in incredulity.

The Witch pursed her lips. “Open it.”

Emma was afraid, and she was right to be, because when she pulled the string on the top of the bag and peered inside, she saw what she’d instantly suspected; more pieces of gold coin than she had ever seen in her entire life. Enough to last her a decade or two. Enough to cover at least half of Henry’s treatments. There came a high keening noise and it took a moment for her to realize that she was the one making it.

The Witch had an unbearably smug smirk on her lips. Emma figured that if she had enough gold that she could flaunt this amount of it as though it was nothing, she’d have the audacity to look smug too.

“This is mine?” Emma gulped. Her hands were shaking. She wanted to grab the bag and—do something, consume it, stuff it in her pocket, anything before it could be taken back.

“It could be,” The Witch said, holding up a finger. “If you do as you are told.”

Typically Emma liked to have a say in the terms. Her clients gave her an objective and she fulfilled it as she saw fit. Usually with as little damage done or attention drawn as possible. But she was already on the verge of nodding and swearing——whatever I’m told.

Who knew she would become a glutton for punishment the moment such vast amounts of money were in play?

“What would that entail?” she asked, still staring at the shimmering gold. Almost afraid, heart pounding, she reached out to touch it, half-certain it was a mirage. But the coin was cold and smooth beneath her fingertip, perfectly round, unlike the tiny nubs of silver and bronze that were passed around in the marketplace. She jerked her hand back before it could disappear.

“While under my employ you will work solely for me. You will take no other Master or Mistress.”

“I’m not a slave,” Emma protested.

The Witch pursed her lips, glaring at her with eyes like the blackest of icy winter nights. “Are we clear?”

“We’re clear,” Emma muttered, scowling at her lap.

“You will arrive on the steps of the Keep within an hour once you are summoned, not a moment later. I will give you a list of objects that you will collect and return to me within seven days.”

“Wait—not people?”

The Witch raised her eyebrow at another interruption. Emma shut up. “Occasionally, perhaps, people, yes. It depends. Whatever I ask of you, you will not question. If you would like to terminate the contract at any time, you may do so, but understand I will never ask you to enter my employ again.

“You may not tell a soul, especially—and this is important—especially the master of this Keep.”

“The Dark One?”

“Yes.”

“Fine.”

“You may take a day to consider it, if you wish.”

Emma shook her head. If she left now she’d never come back; Red would find a dozen reasons to dissuade her. Her own doubt would chip away at her conviction. Henry would be the one who suffered. “I’m ready now.”

The Witch’s mouth curled in a pleased, secretive smirk. Emma wondered what exactly she’d just bargained her life away for.

With a flick of her wrist, The Witch produced a piece of parchment. “This lays out what I’ve already explained to you in writing. Read it.”

“Why do I need to—”

“Read it.”

Emma did as she was told. The curled black lettering outlined everything that The Witch had said to her, almost to the word.

“Now,” The Witch said when she was done. “Sign it.”

“Not with my blood?” Emma quipped under her breath as she took the pen and ink that The Witch handed to her.

“Don’t be a fool. Blood oaths are for quack jobs and frauds. A simple inked signature will do.”

Not a penchant for sarcasm, then.

When Emma was done, The Witch took back the parchment, whispered a few words in a guttural language, and then whisked the contract into thin air.

“Where did you send it?” Emma asked, growing bolder now that it was clear The Witch did not intend her harm——needed, in fact, her specific skill set.

“Away,” The Witch said. “Somewhere safe.”

Emma felt that she was about to be dismissed. “Wait,” she said. “What should I call you? …Madam Dark One?”

The features of The Witch’s face slackened and froze. “Excuse me?”

“Madam Dark—”

“I heard what you said,” The Witch snapped. “Why in all the godforsaken realms would you call me that?”

“I—” Emma was at a loss as to what she’d done wrong. “You’re his wife.”

The Witch’s eyes blew open. “Excuse me?” she shrieked. “His _wife_? Who says that?”

“I…” Emma cringed. “Everyone I know.”

That made The Witch pause. She narrowed her eyes at Emma, who for a moment thought she would be on the receiving end of the wrath that she saw there. Then The Witch’s shoulders relaxed and the lines on her face smoothed. “Let them think what they want,” she muttered as she turned away.

“You’re not?” Emma blurted.

“Not what?”

“His wife?”

“Of course not,” she snapped. “And you can tell that to _everyone you know_.”

“What should I call you then?”

The Witch laced her fingers together and rested her chin on them; a gesture, Emma had noticed, she made when she was thinking. Another human trait that made Emma feel less overwhelmed by the complete unbelievability of this day.

“You may call me Regina.”

((()))

Red was waiting in the doorway for Emma when she returned to the tavern. As soon as Emma turned the curve in the road and came into sight, the taller woman dashed off the stoop and ran towards her full tilt. Emma caught her friend and laughed, all too aware of the satisfying weight of the three gold pieces Regina had given her for insurance to tide her over. It would pay for Henry’s next treatment and there’d be a little left over to make a small dent in their debts. It’d last them until she could do the job and be paid in full.

Red clutched her around the neck, and Emma could feel both a smile and the pinprick of tears against her neck. “You’re alive!” By the time Red pulled back her face was clear and cheery. She cuffed Emma under the chin. “Did you do it?”

Emma smirked and opened her pocket to reveal the coin. Red drew in a sharp breath and stared at her in disbelief. Emma nodded and winked, and Red shrieked in laughter, throwing her arms once more around Emma’s neck and spinning them around in circles. “I can’t believe you’re not dead!”

Emma shook her head. “The vote of confidence is appreciated.” As she spoke, her eyes scanned the street, where a group of children played in sewer water, sailing tiny wooden boats through the puddles. She recognized a boy named Martin, but the rest must have come from other parts of town. The boy she searched for wasn’t among them.

Red squeezed her shoulder. “His breathing wasn’t strong this morning, so I made him stay in bed.”

Emma tilted her head in gratitude.

Red hesitated before speaking again. “He was asking about you. He was upset when I wouldn’t let him play with the other children, but I promised if he stayed in bed and took his medicine without a fuss, then maybe you would go up for a visit when you came home.”

Emma thought of the hopeful picture her son must have made, sipping the vile concoction that kept him alive on the promise that his mother would pay him a visit.

“I don’t know, Red,” she hedged. “The Keep was…strange. I feel like a powder keg of magic right now.” She laughed nervously. “I don’t want anything residual infecting Henry, you know?”

She avoided Red’s eyes as she spoke, already aware of the disappointment she would see there.

“Well, well,” a raspy voice said from the doorway of the tavern. Granny’s hunched form appeared in the doorway. Her eyes glittered with affection as she knocked her cane against Emma’s shin. “You look like trouble,” she teased. “I’m not sure I should let you into my tavern.”

Emma ducked her head so Granny could kiss her on the cheek. “Not even if I come bearing gifts?” she whispered, opening her pocket more discreetly this time so Granny could see her prize without the guests at the bar suspecting anything unusual.

Granny’s eyes flew wide before she managed to compose her expression, which returned to its slightly inverted, grouchy position.

“Alright then, upstairs with you,” Granny said, knocking her cane on the back of Emma’s knees. “Get washed up before you even think about touching a single dish in that kitchen.”

At that Emma realized how hungry she actually was. And exhausted. She’d been flying on adrenaline all day and the crash was bearing down on her like a rock.

She climbed two flights of steps to her attic bedroom, but paused in the narrow corridor at the top, lingering outside the first door. If she listened long enough she’d hear a toddler’s high-pitched cough. But maybe he was sleeping. Maybe Red would have done what Emma did, and add a bit of sleeping powder to the syrupy mixture Henry took every morning, noon and night. It left the toddler dreary and cranky, but at least afforded him a few solid blocks of sleep each day. Otherwise his rest was disturbed every few minutes by the violent, racking coughs that ravaged his lungs and throat. Emma knew very little of medicine, but when she imagined her son’s insides, she pictured a cracked landscape of tortured, burnt flesh. Never peaceful, never soothed.

She waited so long for the familiar, fluttery cough that she almost opened the door to check on her son. She did this sometimes in the dead of night, creeping into his room just to reassure herself that he was still breathing. She’d watch the staccato rise and fall of his chest. Stilted, never restful like the sleep of other children. But there, still, the sign that his heart still beat and his lungs pumped air that would keep him alive a while longer. Just a little while longer, at least. Long enough for Emma to earn enough money for the next treatment. Maybe even long enough that she’d one day be able to find a cure. If the doctor could ever figure out what was wrong with him.

There came a raspy little cough from inside the room just as she placed her hand on the doorknob. Her shoulders slumped and she leaned her head against the wooden frame. A few more coughs came. To anyone else they would sound like a cause for alarm. But she knew the variations of her son’s coughing fits like she knew the contours of her face or the lines in her palm. She’d heard worse——much worse.

She carried on to her own room, where she was grateful to find that someone—Red, probably, as Granny was having trouble with the stairs these days—had stoked the fireplace and a gentle little flame greeted her. Huffing on her hands, she crouched in front of the warmth for a moment to bring feeling back into her extremities.

She warmed a little kettle of water over the flames and took it off the heat before it reached boiling. Then she poured the warm water into an enamel basin and with a cloth washed her hands and arms and face. She did her hair up at the back of her neck and scrubbed behind her ears and the back of her neck. Feeling refreshed and a little more presentable, she changed into a new pair of trousers and a loose shirt.

She was debating between a nap or a meal when there was a knock at the door. “Come in,” she called. It was Red, dressed for the evening crowd in a revealing corset and a skirt that only reached her knees, barely covering the tops of her stockings, where a flash of skin came into view.

Emma shook her head. “Soon you won’t have to do that anymore,” she said.

“What, this?” Red did a twirl and smirked. “I like this.”

“I know, but…” Emma tried to sort her thoughts. “Soon you won’t have to. It can be your choice.”

Red softened. She approached Emma and grasped her hands. “You are like a sister to me. You are family. I hope you know that.” She pressed their foreheads together even as Emma squirmed at the unexpected affection.

“Now,” Red declared, sitting on the bed. “You are going to give me the uncensored version of what happened today.”

Emma shrugged. “There’s not much to tell, really. It’s a job like any other job.”

Red snorted. “Except the client can stick their hand in your chest and pull out your heart.”

“How is that different than most of my clients?” Emma asked, amused as she thought of all the cutthroat criminals she had ever worked for.

Red scowled. “I worry for you, that’s all.”

Emma sat beside her on the bed. “Hey, listen.” She took Red’s hands. “Soon I won’t have to do this anymore either.”

“You say that a lot,” Red muttered.

Emma tilted her friend’s chin. “No, I mean it.” She shook her head. “If you’d have seen it…the gold in my pocket is a promise of more. More gold than you and I could spend in a lifetime between us.”

“Don’t underestimate me,” Red said with a wink.

“I mean it,” Emma repeated with a smirk. “When this job is over…that’s it. We’re set for life. I’m going to the apothecary tomorrow and using this down payment to get what Henry needs, as much it three gold pieces will buy.”

“And what exactly is this job?”

Emma’s face fell. “To be honest, she hasn’t given me the specifics.”

“She?”

“The Wit——Regina. That’s her name. And——listen to this——she’s not the Dark One’s wife at all. She’s his apprentice.”

Red guffawed. “No one will ever believe you,” she said. Emma grinned and squeezed her hands.

“Don’t have to. I don’t care about anything but the gold.”

“And Henry.”

“And Henry.”

“And me,” Red said with glee.

Emma sighed and shook her head. “Yes, yes, and you, I suppose. Now, come on, I’m starving.”

They clattered down the stairs, feeling giddy, like girls again, the weight of the world off their shoulders for the night. Emma plated herself Granny’s venison stew from the kitchen and went to eat at the bar with the regulars, where she was regaled with a dozen questions about her time at the Keep, to which she responded with sly smiles and vague answers.

“You’re enjoying this too much,” Granny said with a glare from the other side of the bar. “I expect the uncensored version later.”

Emma crossed her heart. “Only for you, Granny.”

Three years, it had been, since she’d stumbled cold and hungry through the front door, begging for scraps on a freezing winter evening. She would have tried her luck elsewhere but there were rumors of a wolf roaming about that night, and no one could say if it was a wild one or a shape-shifter. Emma had still had a little will left to live, and she didn’t want to take the chance of running into a real wolf with an appetite.

Then she’d walked into the tavern and came face to face with the wolf itself. Before she could turn and flee, it had bent its back and contorted its neck and transformed into a young naked woman about Emma’s own age. Red. Granny had hurried out from behind the bar, still spry and cane-less, to wrap the girl in a red cloak as she dripped melting snow onto the floor and shivered in her human skin.

The two of them had taken one look at Emma, her stomach a concave, dressed in not nearly enough layers, and ushered her in past the tavern’s dining hall——mostly abandoned so late at night and in such a blizzard——to the washroom, where a huge tub had managed to fit both freezing girls in boiling water. Later Granny put Emma to bed on the same down mattress as Red and they cuddled together for warmth, delirious and drowsy.

Emma found out later that Red had been in the middle of a rebellious phase——her parents had been killed by Enchanted Forest soldiers and she was pushing back against both her grief and Granny’s authority. She’d been missing for days, stalking the borders as a wolf, snapping at any Enchanted Forest guard that came too close. The blizzard had finally forced her to give in and go home.

Emma assisted Granny up the stairs to her chambers while Red took over the crowd at the bar. There was a raucous male cheer, which meant Red had just said something crass or lowered her corset ever so slightly even further down her breasts.

“Now,” Granny said once she was changed into her nightgown and situated underneath her blankets. Emma poked the fire in the hearth. “You’ll tell me what really happened.”

Emma bit her lip, but there was no escaping Granny, whose stare was almost as cold and piercing as The Witch’s. Shivering at the memory, she pulled up Granny’s armchair to the bed and told her every detail of what had happened once she’d been welcomed into the Keep. No, she hadn’t seen the Dark One. No, she hadn’t accepted any food or drink. The Witch wanted to hire her to do what she always did; find things. Emma told her about the gold.

Granny held out her hand, which Emma took; it was too cold for her liking, and she rubbed it between her own palms. “I’m afraid you’re making a deal with the devil, my love.”

She kissed the tips of Granny’s fingers. She didn’t say _I have no choice_. Because Granny would only say, _You always have a choice_. She didn’t understand. Emma would never have a choice, not in this.

((()))

The Witch summoned her a few days later. Though she’d told Emma to call her Regina, she didn’t sign the letter with that name.

“You can still say no,” Red said as she bid her farewell at the door.

“Granny tell you to say that?” Emma said with a smile that didn’t quite touch her eyes. She stiffly accepted Red’s hug.

“Yes,” Red admitted. “But if I’m not saying it, I’m thinking it.”

Emma shook her head and shouldered her pack. “I don’t know how long the job will take. Don’t expect me back for a few days.”

“How long till I send out a search party?”

“I’ll be fine. It’s just a job.”

“Yeah, except for this time your boss could pluck out your heart and keep it as a souvenir.”

“What good would my heart do her?” Emma laughed. She waved Red back inside and trotted around the cobblestone corner before they tried anymore to stop her.

It would rain; Emma could smell the muggy scent of it on the air. The Keep loomed above town. It was early morning and the sleepy village didn’t blink as Emma slipped between houses towards the hill upon which sat that tall gloomy tower. Its spire ascended towards the gray clouds of dawn.

Emma had never given it much thought before, though she’d lived in the town all her life. Witches had their affairs and she had hers. Every once in a while she heard about someone who’d brokered a deal with the Dark One that had gone sour, but most of the people she knew were street rats with nothing to bargain. People with the luxuries of money and time could afford to scheme their way into the Dark One’s favor. Emma only hoped for a hot meal at the end of each day, and she was content doing hard honest work to get it.

Besides, the Dark One preyed on desperate people. She refused to be desperate.

The gate opened as the first raindrops flit down onto Emma’s face. She couldn’t see the mechanism responsible, and there wasn’t an attendant or gatehouse in sight. She supposed she’d have to get used to the uncanny, if she was going to be coming around often.

A servant waited for her in the foyer.

“Where’s the man from yesterday?” Emma asked.

The servant’s expression became perplexed. “This way, Miss,” he murmured, and led her to the winding staircase.

“Is she in the study?” Emma asked.

The servant blinked and stared at her.

“The Wi——Regina.”

“I am to bring you to her, Miss,” the man said. He laced his hands together and glanced nervously up the steps.

“It’s fine,” Emma said quickly. It made her nervous, people waiting on her. “I can find my own way.”

“But Miss——”

“It’s the same room as last time, isn’t it?”

“I don’t think——”

“Leave us, Otto.”

They whipped around as The Witch descended the staircase, waving the servant away without another word, her eyes on Emma. Otto bowed and mumbled, “Madam,” before scurrying out of The Witch’s path like a nervous mouse avoids a barn cat. And with her dark, slitted eyes, it was a fitting comparison.

Emma didn’t bow or lower her eyes, like Otto had. She was an employee but not a subordinate. For some reason the Witch needed her. The Witch had asked for her. And Emma would not let herself be the mouse.

“In the future,” the Witch said. “You will let my servants do as they are told.”

“I can climb a few steps on my own,” Emma began.

“You terrified the poor man,” the Witch snapped. “Our servants are paid to do their jobs. You will let them do it.”

Emma had terrified him? Had the Witch seen his expression the moment she’d swept into sight?

The Witch must have seen the derision in her eyes; she sneered. “I did not invite you here to tell me how to run my household, Emma. And I can revoke that invitation as easily as I sent it.”

“I’m here now,” Emma said with a frown. “So you might as well tell me what the job is and let me get on with it.”

The Witch’s nostrils flared; her slit eyes narrowed. Emma didn’t waver, though her heart pounded. If she was going to have a working relationship with the Witch, she couldn’t cower every time the woman scowled.

“Follow me,” the Witch said at last, brushing past Emma; their hands knocked together. Emma jumped. The Witch’s skin was freezing——cold like the dead.

She saw the Witch smirk.

The Witch led her up the swirling staircase, and it might have just been a figment of her imagination, but Emma could swear the steps spiraled in the opposite direction as when she’d been here last.

“Here is your target,” the Witch said when they reached the study; she handed Emma a piece of parchment on which was a name and a crude drawing of the man’s face.

“Mork,” Emma read. “What’d he do?”

“That’s none of your concern. Once you have him, bring him directly to the Keep and don’t speak his name to anyone. Not the servants, and especially not the master of this Keep, should you be so unfortunate as to run into him.”

Emma looked up in surprise. Keeping secrets from the Dark One himself?

“I want insurance,” she said.

The Witch’s eyebrows shot up. “Excuse me?”

“One gold piece,” Emma bargained. “As insurance.” She was thinking of Henry’s vial of elixir, which was nearly three-quarters empty. She didn’t know how long it would take to find this _Mork_ and collect the full reward.

“You don’t believe I’ll keep my words?”

Emma blinked. “No, I…” Her face burned as she admitted in a whisper. “I need the money.”

The Witch tilted her head and stared at Emma, waiting for her to say more, but when no explanation was forthcoming she sighed and nodded, untying the pouch of coins that still sat so casually at the edge of her desk and plucking a single gold piece from its depths, which she set in Emma’s hand.

Their fingers brushed and Emma jumped at both the icy coldness of her skin and the burst of magic that coursed through her at the Witch’s touch. She gasped and clutched her chest as though she’d been struck by lightning. “What—” She heaved air into her lungs, unable to concentrate until the burning sensation in her chest eased.

The Witch, far from seeing concerned, watched curiously as Emma calmed herself.

“Unusually sensitive,” the Witch murmured. “Are you sure you know nothing of your parentage?”

Emma nodded brusquely. “Are you sure it can’t hurt me?”

The Witch smirked. “Only if I want it to.”

Emma’s pulse jumped at the predatory gaze in the Witch’s eyes, but she kept her composure. “You don’t,” she said, waving the piece of parchment. “You won’t find anyone better than me.”

“I suspect not,” the Witch said. “As that’s precisely why I hired you.”


	4. Chapter Four

Through a slitted window in the stone, Regina watched the bounty hunter depart. The woman, in dark breeches yet still recognizable by her yellow hair, sauntered through the gates at the edge of the property and disappeared beyond the wall of the Keep, heading back down the road to the village.

She would much rather have hired one of the gruff, temperamental men that drank together in the shadow of the Keep on certain nights, waiting for some directive from the Dark One. They were free-hires, but they knew that no one paid more than him.

But she had never asked for their help before and it might have drawn attention for her to start now. She wasn’t stupid enough to believe that they could be loyal to her, but at the right price they might have been loyal to the Dark One.

Despite all his lessons and teaching, all the gifts in her he’d spent these long years honing, she hardly trusted him. And he didn’t expect her to. She was part of a bargain Cora had struck with him on the day of her fourteenth birthday. The day she was to have married Princess Rosemary, had the girl ever been found.

She still didn’t actually know the details of the contract, and at the time she’d been too young and shocked to ask the right questions or protest her mother’s latest whim. She’d expected to be home within the year. Then she’d expected her father would send for her on her eighteenth birthday, so she could join the stag hunt that would mark her transition from apprentice to hunts-woman.

She’d had only one correspondence from her mother in all the years she’d been trapped in this vile tower, and that was to inform her that her father was dead.

Otherwise her instructions were clear; she couldn’t leave the grounds of the Keep——it was, in fact, impossible for her to do so thanks to wards the Dark One had put in place——and in return the Dark One would teach her to harness her magic.

Regina had searched this Keep high and low for Princess Rosemary. The only person who could have been responsible for kidnapping the princess was the man who was currently her master. But all she’d done was waste those first precious years, when she should have been watching and listening and preserving her strength.

Instead she’d had the inane compulsion to search for a girl she hardly remembered and who could have been anywhere in all the realms. There was no rule saying the Dark One had to keep all his prisoners in his dungeon. He probably had some grandiose purpose for the child, after he’d gone to all that trouble to get his hands on her.

But years passed and she never so much as heard Rosemary’s name whispered by a servant or guard. Once a month, the butcher and herbalist came from the village with the Dark One’s special orders, and Regina had questioned them a few times, when she could get away with it. But either they didn’t know or the Dark One had bought their silence, because they shrugged without sympathy and didn’t speak to her.

Now, at twenty-six, Regina knew the truth, and it was no less awful for having had five years to accustom herself to it. She still kicked herself for not having seen it sooner. Wasting all those years in a grim fugue state as she’d tried to discover the fate of the lost princess who had been her betrothed. When all along _Rosemary_ had been the other half of the bargain.

It answered all the questions Regina had always been too afraid to ask. How had Rosemary’s kidnapper slipped past the wards on the Mills’ property? Why had Cora not raised all Hell to try and get her back? The princess had been the key to the grand scheme she had made of Regina’s life.

But, it turned out, it worked just as well with Rosemary out of the picture. The Dark One could have the child he was owed.

In exchange for turning Regina into a sorceress.

So Cora had loosened the wards the night of Rosemary’s disappearance. Regina still didn’t know who exactly had been responsible for the actual kidnapping. There was so much she didn’t know. It could have been the Dark One himself, or he might have gotten one of his lackies to do it for him. He certainly had plenty of those, and she’d questioned all of them too, though not a one had ever cracked, no matter how much money or magic she offered them. She suspected they’d been told by the Dark One that whatever prize Regina dangled in front of them, he would double it.

So she’d gone straight to the source and questioned the Dark One himself. _What did you do with Rosemary? Where is she now? At least tell me if she is alive!_

But the Dark One, in his way, smirked and preened and scratched his leathery skin and tut-tutted, dear, _don’t ask questions you don’t really want to know the answers to._

That was the day Regina finally figured out how to cast fireballs. His burn scars had only lasted half a day before he’d whipped up an ointment that would heal them and vanish the scars completely, but the surprise on his face when she’d actually succeeded was worth the week she’d spent scrubbing feces from the dungeon walls.

“Are we entertaining visitors today?”

Regina whipped away from the window.

The Dark One stood with his back against the wall, legs stretched out in front of him and arms crossed.

“Dark One,” Regina greeted him curtly. She’d once quavered before him, referred to him only ever as my lord. “Polite company would knock.” Now, he could rot in Hell for all she cared. If she could ever catch him off guard again, she had a few choice fireballs all ready to go.

The scaly man stepped towards her. Regina squared her shoulders. “Well, my dear,” he said. “That’s the difference between me and polite company, isn’t it?”

Regina was tired. She’d been up all night doing research for her spell and wasn’t in the mood to verbally spar him today. Deflating, she sat at her desk, behind her collections of test tubes and potions ingredients, various tomes and recipe slips. “What do you want?”

“Why, to check on my dearest pupil.” With a single scaly finger, he sent her globe spinning. She gritted her teeth at the scraping noise his fingernail made.

_Only pupil._ Any other wannabee witch had the self-preservation to keep their distance from the Dark One’s Keep, no matter how impressive it would be to brag that the Green Man himself had taken you under his tutelage.

It wasn’t worth it. Only Cora had ever dared. But that was Cora. And she had gotten exactly what she’d asked for. The power, the potential, the influence. In two decades she had brought a once thriving kingdom to its knees. She had twisted Snow White’s betrayal right back onto the Crown, personally seeing to the disappearance of their daughter before stopping all aid to the White Kingdom’s capitol. And still the drought persisted. The Enchanted Forest had squeezed all the moisture it could from the ground, any nutrients left from the soil. Wild fires had begun to ravage the land, toppling acres of ancient woods.

And Regina knew how to stop it.

She’d given up her escape attempts as soon as she’d learned her mother had sold her to the sorcerer. She’d thrown herself into the studies that previously she had barely tolerated. She would drain the Dark One of his knowledge as surely as Cora had drained the world of water. There was no one but her. She was alone. No help was coming. If anyone could stop the mechanisms at work behind the walls of the Mills mansion, it was going to be the girl who’d once considered it home.

“Cut the games,” she sighed.

He threw his hand to his chest in offense. “Games? Me?”

With a flick of her wrist she threw a transparent funnel of purple magic around his body. His mouth kept moving but his voice immediately cut off. She smirked, and continued translating measurements from the leather volume of spells and potions. Her pen scratched on dry parchment.

“——never should have taught you that trick,” the Dark One grumbled as finally he cut through the wall of magic. Regina checked the time. Twenty seconds, she noted in satisfaction. The longest she’d ever been able to hold him. She was getting stronger.

The Dark One slapped his hand on the desk, an attempt to make her jump, which failed. “Wipe that grin off your face, dearie. You know the rules; no one from the village but the butcher and herbalist allowed. And them only the first day of the month.”

Regina wiped away a smudge of ink with the tip of her finger. “Is that written down somewhere?” she asked.

“It’s a verbal contract.” He pouted.

Regina continued writing. “I never made any such promises.” She paused and glanced up. “Don’t be jealous. Why would I need friends when I have you? The girl is running an errand for me, that’s all.”

“What errand?”

“For a spell.”

His eyes popped in interest. “What spell?”

Regina laughed. “Now that, I don’t have to answer. Don’t worry; I’m sure you’ll be very impressed.”

The Dark One watched her continue to ignore him. “I’m sure I will,” he muttered.

Regina stilled her pen. “Goodbye, Dark One.”

She didn’t look up until the door closed and she sensed his presence was gone. Sniffing, she whispered a word that cleared his stench from the air. Every person’s magic carried a distinct aroma. His reminded her of a swamp that someone had dumped perfume all over to try and mask the scent. That wasn’t the Dark One being vain——it was the natural effect of his magical fingerprint.

The Dark One loved a good surprise. He didn’t suspect her of serious trouble, as she’d hardly caused any in twelve years. Aside from the half-hearted rebellion in the beginning. But that had been the rebellion of an adolescent girl with no control over magic——an easy creature to harness for a thousand-year-old wizard.

Aside from the fireball incident, she had been nothing if not an appeasing and studious pupil. And even when Regina had cast those fireballs, the Dark One hadn’t been angry——he’d _laughed_. He was halfway unhinged on any given day, but that had been different. He’d never been a masochist, unless there was something he wasn’t telling, but he’d screamed in delight as his flesh burned and the flames licked higher and higher up his arms. She was learning, he’d said. Only high emotion could create unstoppable magic, and she had been so cut off from her own emotions for so long that he had feared she’d never amount to anything more than a mediocre witch, despite her parentage and potential.

It left her seething for days, the knowledge that she had essentially fallen right into his trap. He was always playing those games with her, making her think he wanted one thing in order to get her to do the opposite.

He didn’t mind at all that she unabashedly hated him; everything was kindling to the Dark One. He could turn anything into a match. For all that he seemed so detached from reality, he had an uncanny ability to see straight into a person’s soul. In one conversation he could deduce what made you tick; in twelve years he could fine-tune every string till he could play you like a fiddle.

Well. Two could play at that game.

The Dark One had taught Regina many lessons throughout the long years. The magic, the potions, the spells, how to harness the very energy of the earth to do your bidding. But they were all secondary to the other lessons he had passed along without intending it. The manipulations, the half-truths. The game of knowledge. And that, Regina considered more valuable, even, than the magic. Magic was a means to an end, but it was useless if you didn’t have the wit to pull back the mask and see your opponent’s truest intentions and desires. You couldn’t manipulate someone you didn’t know, didn’t understand.

Regina was playing a high-stakes game these days. To take on the Dark One——to take on her mother. There was so much damage to undo. She might never find Rosemary, but this had become so much bigger than one lost little princess. Five years of research had led her to this point. Her own spell, a conglomerate of magical pieces that she had improvised and manipulated until it made the perfect shape. Behind her, on the window ledge, an array of plants stood at attention. Their stalks were firm and green and soon they would bloom. She had to be ready when they did.

((()))

From an array of names, Regina had plucked Emma’s deliberately.

She had no connections, as far as Regina could tell. No ulterior motives. No tricks up her sleeves. For her it was just a job, a way of keeping a roof over her head and bread on the table. At least, that was the report Regina had been given. It wasn’t until she learned about the child that she knew for sure that she’d chosen well. This was no mountain hardened missionary. This was no cutthroat bandit who would turn coats right there on the battle field if offered the right price.

Those sorts of men had their uses, for sure. But that wasn’t what Regina needed. She needed someone who would ask no questions because they had more at stake than gold. Someone who’d grown up in the shadow of the Dark One’s Keep and at least half-believed all the rumors that circulated about the cackling witch that lived at the top of the tower. Was normal enough to feel threatened by her, but talented enough that they could do the job. Emma fit all of these parameters.

But it was the child that convinced Regina. Easy leverage, for one. A guarantee that Emma’s motivations were pure.

She drew back the curtain from the full-length mirror that stood in the corner of her study. With a small pen knife, she pricked her thumb, then squeezed a few drops of blood at the top of the glass. Her reflection wavered, like ripples in a pond. Then the picture cleared and in her stead was a vision of another place, a small room in a tavern where a little boy lay sleeping.

“Henry,” Regina whispered.

His name was_ Henry_. If that wasn’t a sign…

She froze as a second figure came into view. She recognized the long blond hair immediately. Emma perched on a chair by her son’s bed while he slept. She did not move to wake him. Once, when his body convulsed——a signal to Regina that he was coughing, although she couldn’t hear anything through the mirror——Emma got up and went away and came back with a salve which she rubbed on the boy’s chest. Her lips moved, and the way she prolonged the shapes of sounds with her mouth made Regina suspect she was singing.

Regina got a stool and sat before the mirror. She’d seen Emma enter the room before, but usually her movements were brusque, businesslike. She held herself aloof. She made the boy take a syrupy concoction that he hated. He’d whine and hide under the covers and Emma would make it a game where she tickled him through the sheets. But even then, Regina could tell that her body was going through the motions, acting the part in a play she hadn’t auditioned for. Sometimes the boy would laugh so hard he had a coughing fit, and Emma would take her hands away and stand there, and Regina would watch her body sag as the playfulness drained out of it.

She didn’t know what was wrong with the boy. She could only watch. Henry’s name she had procured from an information gatherer whose services she hired from time to time. He had been unclear on the diagnosis as well, and since he had no reason to withhold that sort of information, Regina suspected that even Emma didn’t know what was making her son sick.

Nevertheless, she was pleased to know where her money was going, and it wouldn’t be to whiskey or women or opium. She recognized the bottle of salve in Emma’s hand; it came from one of the most expensive and high end apothecaries in a neighboring, wealthier village. Not something Emma, who did cheap bounty hunter work for the sheriff, could have ever afforded before Regina dropped four gold pieces into her hand.

Eventually the picture started to fade. She had only fed the mirror a few drops of blood, so it hadn’t been made to last. Nevertheless she returned to her own work feeling full and satisfied, though a little sluggish and sleepy. Blood magic took quite a bit out of anyone, even her, whose power was beginning to rival the Dark One’s for strength and subtlety.

She did wonder how much longer he would be willing to keep her around. Surely he must notice that she was no longer that timid country girl, banished from her home and alone in the world. Fresh meat ripe for the spit. The Dark One had a way of taking people and making them his, long before they realized that their wishes had landed them in the hands of a con-artist. But Regina didn’t have any wishes. Her role as the Dark One’s ward and pupil was her mother’s wish, not hers. Just because she’d finally acquiesced to playing along didn’t mean there was a single thing that she had left for the Dark One or Cora to hang over her head and leverage for her obedience.

Even if the Dark One cast her out now, she knew too much; she had been too good of a student. She could finish her studies on her own, if there was even any magic left to learn that she hadn’t read about in some book or scroll of spells, or a sign the Dark One hadn’t made her drill again and again until her hand could cast it without thinking. Besides, his was not the only Keep in Garmir, where all the dirty wizards went when the Enchanted Forest got wise to their corruptive tendencies. She doubted they had any tricks to teach her, but sometimes they had in their possession the odd rare, thousand-year-old moth-eaten volume whose value they didn’t suspect.

The point was, she could be a sorceress in her own right, if she so chose. And if the Dark One knew it then Cora did too. So the gamble was either; keep her locked up here indefinitely, letting her magic grow stronger and stronger until it bubbled over and threatened to destroy them, or let her loose on the world, and hope she didn’t get it in her head to seek revenge on her jail-keepers.

Or maybe Cora had a plan for her. Why would she have gone to all the trouble of dealing with the devil? She could have asked the Dark One for anything in return for Emma. That was something Regina had never been able to figure out in all the years as the Dark One’s charge: her mother’s angle. All the magic in the world was useless to her if her mother remained an enigma. She couldn’t outsmart what she didn’t understand.

Regina walked to the window and worried the prick she’d made on her thumb until fresh blood pooled on her skin. She hovered over the plants on the windowsill, each one in turn, and squeezed a drop of blood into their soil, which bubbled and hissed for a moment before growing still. Afterward, the green stalks seemed to stand a little taller, a little brighter than before.

Now she really needed to rest. Watching Henry through the mirror had been an indulgence, one that she couldn’t afford. Blood magic was rare and precious as the moon. Not every witch could access the deep well of energy that flowed through the blood of their own veins.

For what she planned to do, she needed to reserve as much power as possible. She needed another energy source. One that couldn’t be exhausted so easily. And for that, she’d hired Emma.

Regina awoke to loud beating on the other side of the door. A servant was shouting. She leapt to her feet and paused a moment to adjust her bust and hair in the mirror, before throwing open the door. A servant stood there, fist raised to knock again, but the moment he met her cool gaze he dropped to the ground in a low bow.

“Sorry, m’lady,” the servant murmured, eyes downcast. “No one could reach you.”

“Of course not,” Regina snapped. “I was working.”

“The bounty hunter has returned, m’lady,” the servant explained. “She insisted we send for you at once. We tried to tell her——”

“It’s fine,” Regina said, closing and locking the door to her study and brushing past the protracted body. “Get up.”

She glanced out the window on the first landing. Stars dotted a blanket of indigo. She had slept the afternoon away, it seemed. No matter. All the better, in fact, now that it looked like she’d be awake through the night. If Emma had indeed succeeded so quickly. Two days had passed since she’d given her missive to the bounty hunter. She hadn’t expected to see her so soon, at least not person. Especially because she knew that only hours before Emma had been crouched at her son’s side, applying a balm to his cracked, dry lips.

As instructed, Emma had delivered her charge to the dungeon, and Regina descended several flights of steps before she came to the hidden tunnel that took her straight underneath the village to a sealed up cave entrance. She whispered a few words and the mirage of the blockage shimmered and vanished. On the other side Emma waited. She looked at least a little impressed, which pleased Regina. It was rare she got to show off her powers for anyone aside from the Dark One, and he was a harsh critic. The average layperson had very little access to magic at all, and what they did have usually constituted a traveling herbalist with a little spark of magical ancestry that allowed her healing powers to be just a little bit stronger than the average local apothecary.

The man beside Emma had a burlap sack tied over his head. He was propped against a boulder and his resistance was minimal.

“Slipped him a sleeping powder in his drink,” Emma explained as Regina appraised his comatose form.

“I can see that,” Regina said dryly. “What I’m having trouble deducing is how you carried a man the size of a horse all the way out here.”

Emma frowned. “I’m stronger than I look.”

They stared at each other for a moment. Regina got the feeling that sometimes overcame her when she dueled with the Dark One. An itch. An anger. She wasn’t used to being challenged. Least of all by some impoverished village girl. But Emma made her comment lightly; she was hardly being combative, so Regina tried to quell it.

“Never mind,” she said. “Bring him, then.”

She pretended not to watch as Emma, with nothing much more than a short grunt, hefted the man onto her shoulders and followed Regina past the entrance to the cave. Regina gestured for her to wait and quickly rewove the spell that would once again made the tunnel look as though it had caved in long ago. Regina wondered if she would also have to threaten Emma to keep the secret of the tunnel, but the girl studied the wall, hardly breaking a sweat as the man dangled from her shoulders. She knew what was good for her, then.

They re-entered the main tunnel, which they followed to the dungeon proper, a series of cells blocked by thick wooden doors and iron bars. There was no need for guards; what couldn’t be seen were the magical enchantments that made escape impossible. The locked doors were practically for show. No one was getting out of here if the Dark One didn’t want them to.

Regina, as a rule, avoided the prisoners he kept. He had his reasons and she didn’t want to know them. There was nothing she could have done to help the men and women trapped down here, anyway. Most of them were wraiths of their former selves, skin and bone almost-corpses that couldn’t die no matter how much they pleaded with the sorcerer to give them the mercy of death.

Emma wrinkled her nose at the smell. Regina was sure she hadn’t missed the hunched, quavering silhouettes of the prisoners in each cell.

“Is this…what you’re going to do to him?” she asked quietly.

“If you gave him to your sheriff he’d be hanged in a day or two anyway,” Regina pointed out dryly.

“I almost think that’s a fate better than this,” Emma muttered, almost to herself.

“But no,” Regina continued. “This is your drop point, but it is not where he will stay. I have other…reasons for wanting him.”

She’d said too much. She immediately knew it. Emma turned to her, curiosity piqued. “What did he do to you?”

“Nothing. I’m sure the sheriff gave you his profile.”

“I didn’t go through the sheriff,” Emma said with a shrug, setting down Mork’s body in front of an empty cell. Regina didn’t tell her not to bother. “Besides, I prefer not to know what the marks do, usually.”

“Naturally, you change your habits now,” Regina sniffed.

Emma glanced at her. “I’ve just never seen prison conditions…quite like this.”

“These are the sorcerer’s prisoners,” Regina said coldly. She wasn’t evil, no matter what they liked to say about her. Pragmatic, perhaps. Ruthless. But never cruel. She would never allow souls to perpetually suffer like this. “Not mine. I have nothing to do with this.”

“What do you have to do with him, then,” Emma said quietly, gesturing to Mork.

“Would you like to keep asking questions you don’t want to know the answers to, or shall we complete the transaction?”

Emma gave one last lingering look at the man, wrapped in a pungent smell of beer-sweat and bar fights, and turned back to Regina with a look of surrender.

Regina flicked her fingers and four gold pieces appeared. “As promised,” she said.

She swore she saw Emma’s body slump in relief the moment the coins were in her hand. A warm sort of satisfaction coiled up her chest, because she knew where those coins were going. For once she didn’t feel slimy or guilty for putting money in the hands of men who weren’t all that far removed from the criminals they were paid to find.

“Go back the way you came,” she directed Emma. “The spell recognizes you now, so the mirage won’t be disrupted if you pass through it.”

Emma hesitated. “It’s not…dangerous?”

Regina smirked. “Well, I would say not, but you’re the one with that strange aversion to magical energy so, who knows? It might hurt. But you’ll be fine.”

“Comforting.” Emma lingered.

Regina sighed. “What now?”

“My next job?” Emma hinted. “You said there were several.”

“I’ll call for you when I need you. And Emma,” she said just as the girl was turning towards the tunnel that would take her home. “This man.” She nudged the body with her foot and grimaced at the bulbous, fleshy feeling on her boot. “You can rest easy knowing you rid the world of a monster who raped his sister’s child.”

Emma stopped cold. All the color drained from her already pale face. “Are you telling the truth?” she whispered.

“I never lie.”


	5. Chapter Five

Emma returned to the tavern cold and shaking. Her body was alight, her mind grappling with what she had seen. She didn’t know if she could believe the Witch. She was an idiot for even questioning it. Of course she shouldn’t believe a witch. But _this_ witch had thus far done nothing to dissuade her trust except exist in proximity to a sorcerer renowned for his tricks.

The gold was real. She’d taken it to a metal-smith and paid him half of one to test the coins. He’d probably have slit her throat right there for all that money if he didn’t know she was under Red’s protection. Being friends with a giant wolf who owned the local drinking haunt had its perks. Even so, the metal-smith, Gorum, had stared at the gold with the lust of a madman. The villagers in these parts dealt in copper coins or traded with each other for necessities. Emma could count on one hand the number of times she’d even seen a gold coin in her life, never mind four of them, with more on the way as long as she kept her mouth shut and did the Witch’s bidding.

Which, it turned out, was going to be less of a problem than she’d originally thought. The Witch was right; a man like Mork would be hanged for his crime within the week if Emma turned him into the sheriff, and she’d get a lot less money out of the bargain.

His crime. Emma had vomited as soon as she was out of the Witch’s sight. She couldn’t stop thinking about Henry. She’d wanted to be home with him that very second, wanted him in her arms right then. Check all his extremities, listen to his breathing. Make sure he was safe. But there was something she’d had to do first, and it required the long, cold trek to the neighboring town of Ketil, where she could find the medicine Henry needed at a higher price but guaranteed quality. She didn’t trust the watered down stuff they sold in Sog.

She arrived as the mist was lifting to reveal what would surely be a warm, shining dawn. Ketil had a clock tower that Emma above the red-roofed houses and sun-rays pinged off of it, making the sky sparkle as Emma emerged from the woods and followed the well-laid path into the heart of town. She lingered on the green for a while, trying not to look like she was loitering while she waited for the apothecary to open. The man who owned it was sympathetic to her plight, and had met Henry personally on one occasion, for when he noticed her waiting outside he let her in.

While he prepared Henry’s medication, Emma asked, “Doc in today?”

The man, Hugo, shook his head. He was mute——no tongue.

“Well, tell him I was here. And I’d like him to come take a look at Henry.”

The man paused. He glanced up at Emma in surprise.

“I can pay,” Emma said, flushing. “I came into some money recently.”

The man held up his hands and shrugged; it was none of his business. He packaged Henry’s medication.

“So you’ll tell him?” Emma asked.

The man nodded, smiling kindly. He wrote the price on a piece of paper which they both signed once she’d handed the gold piece over. He raised an eyebrow at her when he saw it, but counted out the change.

“I didn’t steal it, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

The man shook his head and crossed his heart. He patted Emma’s cheek and sent her on her way.

With several smaller coins jingling in her pocket, Emma crested the hill and trekked back in the direction of home. Her joints ached by the time she reached the tavern. She had been awake for over two days, not allowing herself a moment’s rest, except for a few spare minutes she’d spent with Henry before going to close in on Mork.

The thought of Mork made her gag on air. She dry-heaved into an alley before entering the through the side door. Red was at the bar, looking exhausted. Her make-up had faded and her hair billowed out from its braid in messy strands.

“Still up?” she asked quietly as she rounded the bar.

Red gasped and looked up; she looked as delirious with exhaustion as Emma felt. But her friend still had the wherewithal to duck out from behind the bar and grasp her in a tight hug against her chest.

“Er…hello to you too.” Emma stood stiffly in her friend’s embrace.

Sheepishly, Red took a step back and rubbed her eyes, smudging her make-up further. Emma smiled and found a clean rag behind the bar, which she used to wipe the smudges off her friend’s face.

“Thank you,” Red said in a raspy voice.

“Long night?”

“You could say that.”

Something in her voice made Emma pause. “What is it? Is it Henry?”

Red shook her head. “Nothing like that, don’t worry. Henry’s fine. Granny kept vigil last night.”

Emma released a shaky breath.

Red crossed her arms over her torso. “Emma…I know I said I was thinking about…well. You know.”

Emma nodded slowly. Red had talked about this for a long time. Men paid more for drink if they knew they would be getting women too. Providing that sort of…service attracted customers. Customers willing to pay to keep this place afloat.

Red hiccuped and tried to cover her face but Emma grabbed her arms. “Hey, hey. You’re freezing.” She rubbed her hands against Red’s skin, but her friend was shaking and couldn’t sit still, so instead Emma dragged two chairs in front of the fireplace and set several dry logs in the hearth. She sparked the kindling and threw it on top of the pile. Then she sat Red down on one of the chairs and wrapped a shawl around her shoulders.

“Alright then,” she said, sitting down in the second chair. “Tell me.”

Red shook her head and wiped the shawl across her wet eyes. “You first.”

“What, the Witch? I told you, it’s like any other job. It’s boring, really. Well.” She smirked. “Boring except for this.” She opened her palm to show Red the coin.

Red’s eyes blew open. “Is that real?” she demanded.

Emma nodded. “I got Gorum to test the first batch she gave me. I’ll have him test this too, just in case. But I think it’s real, Red. She’s the sort who keeps her word.”

“Be careful,” Red whispered, brushing the coin with the tip of her fingers. “I never heard of a witch that keeps her word.”

Emma shook her head. “She says she doesn’t lie, and I believe her.”

Red gave her a worried look.

Emma sighed. “I have to believe her,” she said. “For Henry. For you. For this place. You won’t have to turn it into a pleasure house if we have the money to run it honest. And it’s right here, in the palm of my hand.”

“I can’t ask you to do that.” Red balked. “That’s your gold. You earned it.”

“I’ve never been able to pay you and Granny back for taking me in. I promised myself that I would. I’m making good on that.” She pressed two of the coins into Red’s hand and folded her fingers over them when her friend resisted. “Start with this.”

“I…”

“Hey.” Emma ducked her head to meet Red’s eyes. “This is my home too, you know?”

Red sniffled. “You never called it that before.”

“Hmm?”

“Home.”

Emma felt her face get hot. “I don’t mean to presume…”

“Oh, Emma!” Red laughed and punched her lightly in the shoulder. “You idiot. Of course this is your home! I didn’t say so before because…well…I didn’t want you to feel like you were tied down or stuck with us.”

Emma blinked at her in amazement. “I don’t think that at all.” She wished she could put into words for Red how tired she was. She’d been a migrant out of necessity, never staying in one place long enough for the local authorities to notice a dirty girl-child picking pockets in the middle of the town square. She was so, so tired. Tired of running, tired of being afraid. Tired of always being on the brink of losing the fragile little piece of the world she’d found for herself.

Red shivered and Emma put another log on the fire. “Your turn,” she said.

“There’s nothing to tell, really,” Red said, but her gaze was very far off as she stared into the flames.

“Try.”

Red fingered the frays at the end of the shawl. “It was the same as every night, I made the rounds, made sure everyone was topped off. There was a bit of touching here or there, on my backside or chest but you know I’m fine with that, that’s normal.

“They’re scared of me, you know? It adds to the thrill for them but, I mean, they wouldn’t try anything with me. They know better.

“The other girls, well, I’ve always told ‘em they can do what they want. Not gonna deny ‘em a chance to earn a little extra income, you know? Just do your business off the premises, that’s all. Come to find out, a couple of ‘em have been operating out of one of the rooms upstairs. They paid the rent, fair and square, so I couldn’t have much to complain about, and I told them they might as well keep doin’ it, as long as the tavern gets a share. They can decide how much. We’ve always been good to ‘em and they’re fair girls, they’ll decide what’s right. If taxes rise again I can always change the policy, ask for more…” Red closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“Get to it, Red,” Emma said quietly.

“Well, word got out, I guess. Tonight was packed. More people n’ I’ve seen in here since I was Henry’s age, maybe. I thought, gee, why did it take me so long to get around to doin’ this? It’s not so bad. Really just a night like any other, except every once in a while a fella would slink off with one of the girls and come back downstairs a while later.

“I thought everything was normal. Then I heard screaming. Me n’ one of the other girls, Talli, her name is, you know her, started here last month, the cute little brunette? Well our eyes meet and we know it’s bad right away. The screaming doesn’t stop in all the minutes it took us to get to the second floor. You know that little back room with the slanted ceiling? And two big men are blocking the door. I never seen ‘em before but I see Talli go white as a sheet. And then they’re laughing at us when we try to get in the room. Shoving us back like we hardly weigh more’n a rat.”

“Oh Red,” Emma breathed.

“By the time they left, the screaming stopped. Another man comes out of the room. He laughs at us too and goes on his way. I don’t even think they paid. When we go in…” She closed her eyes. “May’s slashed open up and down her thighs. It’s a blood game, Talli says. They get off on it.” She furiously rubbed the salty streaks off her nose and chin. “I’m so stupid. You hear about this stuff happening but you never think it’ll happen to you. Your establishment. Your people.”

“Of course not,” Emma insisted softly. “It shouldn’t happen at all.”

“But it did,” Red croaked. “And I should’ve been prepared. I couldn’t even turn, Emma, I couldn’t run him down. I was in shock and May needed help and I didn’t know which direction was what. We had to stop the bleeding. We had to, Emma. I couldn’t get him and save her too.”

“You did the right thing,” Emma affirmed, rubbing her back in soothing circles.

Red hiccuped. “The worst part is, it’ll just keep happening. If not here, then somewhere else. If I put a stop to it, I’m scared one of these days I’ll find Talli or May or Belle dead in a ditch. At least if they’re upstairs they can call for help and someone will hear.”

Above the crackling of the fire, another noise Emma with the dawn. A pitiful, childish cry.

They both looked up at the ceiling.

“Did you get his medicine?” Red asked, clearing her eyes then, and casting the shawl off her shoulders.

Emma nodded.

“Go to him, please.”

“Are you sure?”

Red smiled and cuffed Emma’s chin. “Always the worrier. I’ll be fine. Gotta get breakfast ready for the morning crowd.”

Already they could hear stirrings in the house. The guests on the second floor would soon start to trickle down, complaining of the odd cramp or bed bugs, or some other imaginary woe that might make Red look upon them with pity and give them a discount on their room or breakfast. But Red didn’t play that way and they knew it. They sulked under her stern eye and then dug into their breakfasts without trying again.

Emma passed several on the stairs to her son’s room. Those that made eye contact did so grimly. They must have all borne witness to the events of last night. Emma wondered how many had locked their doors and let the cry for help go unheeded. Judging by the number of guilty expressions, quite a few. She frowned when they looked at her; she would not absolve them.

The toddler was sitting up in bed when she opened the door to his room. He reached for her immediately, and though her heart clenched and she longed to rush him into her arms, she ruffled his hair instead and prepared his dose on the bedside table.

“Blech,” Henry said.

“It’ll make you feel better.” Emma recited the same old argument with a sigh.

“It’s yucky,” Henry whined.

Emma caught him mid-complaint with his mouth open and stuck the spoon down his throat. He sputtered in betrayal as he was forced to swallow the bitter concoction, but Emma ruffled his hair again and winked, and as soon as the medicine was gone, all ill will faded away. Henry had a smile like the sun and from it Emma could tell if the day was going to be a good one or not. He might have been the only person in the house blissfully unaware of what had transpired the night before, and he hadn’t had a coughing fit once since she’d come into the room. That made a good start, in his book.

Emma crouched by his pillow. “Do you want to come downstairs for breakfast, or Red can bring it up here.”

Usually he was too exhausted from tossing and turning in fever all night to even consider getting out of bed, but he wiggled his toes and nodded exuberantly, stretching out his arms for her to carry him. She obliged, feeling his warm, sleepy baby skin against hers.

She wrinkled her nose. “You stink. You need a bath.”

The toddler looked at her in abject horror. “Med’cin _and_ bath?”

“Normal humans take baths, yes,” Emma said as she clopped down the stairs, exaggerating the bounce in her step to make him laugh and forget about his soapy fate.

Red’s whole face lit up when she saw Henry. “My little man!” she cried; she and Henry reached for each other at the same time and met in the middle as Emma passed him off to her friend and set about rummaging the kitchen for breakfast.

The breakfast crowd hummed lightly around them, in a more somber mood than usual. As Henry ate finger-food at the bar, Emma studied each person in turn. Most lodgers were from out of town, just passing through and requiring a cheap room in order to spend the night away from the elements. Emma didn’t think she’d glean the information she needed from any of them, but it was worth a try.

“Ok here, kid?” she asked Henry, who grinned behind his sticky hands and nodded.

“We got each other’s backs, right Henry?” Red said, coming up behind the boy and tickling his sides. “You go do your thing, Emma.”

“Mind if I sit?” Emma asked a man sitting alone at a table for four. His grizzled expression told her that yes, he did mind, but he also wanted his breakfast, and the glare on Red’s face from the other side of the room told him he wouldn’t get it if he didn’t oblige.

“Go on,” he muttered, picking his fingernails. “Hey lady,” he called to Red. “You sell booze here in the mornings?”

“Answer my friend’s questions and maybe we’ll see,” Red snapped back as she whisked several bowls of breakfast to every table but theirs.

“This is persecution, what it is,” the man said to Emma. “I’m a paying customer, same as anyone.”

“You’re right,” Emma said. “But we——” she gestured between Red and herself. “Aren’t asking you to pay in coin.”

The man raised his eyebrow at that, but Emma could tell she had him hooked.

“We want information,” she said.

The man deflated, like he’d known it had sounded too good to be true. “Look, lady, if this is about what happened last night——”

“Well, since you brought it up,” Emma said, leaning over the table, close enough to follow each individual bristle of his beard. “What room did you stay in last night, Mister…”

“Ramk.”

“Ramk. Sure, ok. Which room was yours last night, Mister Ramk?” She drawled his name, saying it loud enough for everyone in the room to hear. He glared. She smirked. “Because you know what I think? I think I saw you come out Room 203 this morning. And do you know which room is next to 203, Mister Ramk?”

“Figure you’re gonna tell me, aren’t ya, wise ass?”

“Nah. Not gonna waste my breath on what we both already know.” Emma shrugged, then narrowed her eyes and leaned closer. “Look, sir, I don’t care what you did or did not do to help the girl in 204 who was screaming for her life last night. But if you know the identity of the man who’s responsible for her nearly bleeding to death out on the floor, that is what you’re going to tell me. Otherwise I have my friend’s complete permission to throw you out the door on your ass and leave my boot-print on your face.”

“In all the realms, lady,” the man huffed. “You don’t gotta play bad cop with me. I woulda told ya without all the hullabaloo.”

Emma folded her hands and waited.

The man leaned towards her. “Look, these guys are bad news, OK? If I’da tried anything myself last night I woulda been dead. Like slit throat, blood dripping through the floorboards onto your pretty head, _dead_. And I wouldn’t be alive to give you a name or a place. Both of which I do know, by the way. But it’s going to cost you a lot more than breakfast.”

((()))

The Witch summoned Emma that same afternoon. She knew the routine by now and saw herself up to the tower, much to the bewilderment of the servant who tried to accompany her.

“Look,” she said as she burst into the Witch’s study. “I have a man for you.”

“I have a man for you,” the Witch returned.

Emma paused. “Who’s your guy?”

“So glad you asked,” the Witch said dryly, and passed a sheet of parchment to Emma with the victim’s information.

Emma tried to swallow that thought back. These weren’t the victims here. If anything she was bringing perpetrators to justice.

That was the story she was telling herself.

“He goes by Grimm,” the Witch said. The man was bald and a had a crooked nose, but once he might have been handsome.

Emma glanced up. “What did he do?” she asked quietly.

“Does it matter?”

“It does to me.”

The Witch sighed. “A notice was put out for his arrest last month after he led a burglary on a traveling caravan.”

Emma remembered the caravan. A performing troupe that had done fantastic trapeze acts in the town green. Henry had begged to go, but that morning his fever spiked and he languished in a delirious haze for two days.

“Just burglary?” she clarified.

The Witch leveled her an expression so thoughtful and penetrating that she eventually had to lower her eyes, even though she knew it would please the Witch to see her intimidated.

“Reports came in last night,” the Witch said. “That he attacked a girl in town. Cut her at the thighs so that she nearly bled to death.”

Emma closed her eyes. It brought her no comfort that the Witch’s target was, of course, exactly the man on whom she sought vengeance. It was too much of a coincidence.

“How did you know?”

“My sources are my own.”

“No,” Emma said, stepping up to the desk so that she looked down upon the Witch. “How is your man the same as mine?”

“Men get around.”

“You know what I mean. How did you know?”

The Witch suddenly seemed to lose interest; she licked her thumb and used it to turn the page of the leather volume spread out in front of her.

Heart pounding, Emma cut to the heart of the matter; “Are you spying on me?”

The Witch’s eyes snapped up to meet hers. They seemed less feline than Emma remembered. But they were just as dark, halos of purple smoke swirling in their depths. For the first time they looked not just inhuman, but monstrous. Unnatural.

Emma jumped away from those eyes without thinking. There was a clatter, and an inkwell on the table tumbled on its side. Black ink stained Emma’s fingers as they slid in the puddle of it pooling on the dark wood. She gasped and looked up at the Witch wildly, expecting some sort of immediate retribution.

But the Witch laughed. The noise came from deep in her throat. Guttural. “Oh, you are trouble, aren’t you, Emma? Almost more trouble than you’re worth. But, ah…” She waved her hand. “I have spies everywhere. Don’t you go and start thinking you’re special.” She tapped a finger to her nose, grinning. A wide, witchy grin that scared Emma more than anything else she had yet seen. “Do you want the job or not? I assure you there is a long line of people waiting to take your place.” Her eyes flicked down to the pouch of coins that sat on the edge of the table, tantalizing and glimmering.

Emma grit her teeth. She kept the picture of Henry in her mind’s eye.

“I want the job.”

The Witch leaned forward, fingers laced together, eyes glittering with pleasure. “Excellent.”

Emma left the Keep immensely dissatisfied, feeling as though she had lost a game she hadn’t been aware she was playing.

At least, in some respects, the Witch’s morals almost seemed to align with her own. These were scum of the lowest sort; Emma might not know what happened after she dropped the men off at the end of that long, deserted tunnel, but she could be glad, at least, to get them off the streets.

It was too much to hope that the Witch’s only interest was ridding the world of mongrels who preyed on children and women. If that was the case, then she could have just let the local law enforcement carry on doing its job. Emma suspected there was another reason that the Witch had made it her business, but she couldn’t for the life of her imagine what it was.

Well, she could imagine a thousand reasons, based on town gossip that had circulated about the Witch for as long as she could remember; she was going to use them in sacrifice; she was going to cut out their internal organs and eat them; she was going to brainwash them, or remove their brains and make them her puppets. And so on.

This was exactly the sort of trouble Red had been afraid of when she begged Emma not to go. What Granny, with that grim concern in her eyes, must imagine every time she watched Emma walk out the front door. Emma had laughed at them; no one had seen hide or tail of the Witch in years, and they thought they could tell what went on in the Dark One’s Keep? For all they knew, he’d hired her as his personal housekeeping assistant.

Now though…she’d stood before the Witch at the very top of the tower and seen the indigo storm brewing in her eyes. She was no mere pawn of the Dark One’s. She was a real Witch, in her own right. Which meant the town of Sax was residence to not one, but two sorcerers with the power to wipe them all out with no more than a whim and a flick of the wrist.

She returned home for an early dinner. Grimm, as far as the reports went, was still in town, so she had time to say hello to Henry before his bedtime.

Red immediately noted the exhaustion on her face and rushed to her side. “Come on,” she murmured, leading Emma to the bar. She whisked away and returned with a bowl of that night’s stew, fresh out of the pot, but Emma, as she stared down at the pieces of salted pork and carrot and potato, found that she had no appetite.

“You love pork stew,” Red coaxed.

“I’ll bring some up to Henry,” Emma offered, even though Granny didn’t allow food in the bedrooms. Only Henry was an exception when he wasn’t well enough to get out of bed and come downstairs.

Red’s eyes narrowed in concern. “Emma…I hope you know what you’re doing.” And they both knew she wasn’t talking about Henry or the stew. But she didn’t protest anymore as Emma scooped up a second bowl and carried it two flights up.

Henry had propped himself up on the window seat and stared down at the square below.

“What are you doing out of bed?” Emma said in surprise.

Henry leaned off his elbows and grinned. “Mama!” he said, waving his arms between himself and the bed as if to prove he’d done it himself.

“Yah, I can see,” Emma murmured, sitting on the floor in front of him. “Think you could eat something too?”

Henry’s smile drooped, and she tried to perk herself up. “Come on, Red made our favorite.”

They sat on the floor and ate spoonfuls of stew. She did less eating and more studying Henry’s face, rosy not with fever but with content as he accepted each bite she offered and giggled when it dribbled down his chin. He reminded her of the babbling baby he’d been less than a year ago. She didn’t hear his voice very often anymore. It took too much effort, and hurt his throat most days. He’d gotten sick before he’d really learned to speak, and Emma was afraid he’d never catch up now.

But fearing for his speech was better than fearing for his life, and she contented herself with that as they sat on the cold wooden floorboards and ate together like something that was almost normal. She’d forgotten any sort of cloth or rag, so she let him wipe his face with his hands and then lick the extra gravy off his fingers, and he looked absolutely scandalized, because it was something Granny would have had both their heads for.

When she put him back to bed he asked for a story, and she smiled sadly. “No time, little knight. Tomorrow, promise.”

He reached for her as she tried to leave, and he looked so pitiful that she returned and let him wrap his skinny arms around her neck. They barely reached all the way around, and so she sat on the bed and did what she knew he really wanted, which was to settle him on her lap so he could snuggle against her chest.

She didn’t hold him like this often. It made her too nervous. She still wasn’t sure if the maternal instinct was something that she lacked or not. Red or Granny seemed so much more natural with him. But Red always smiled knowingly when she complained, and assured her that it didn’t matter how maternal she was or wasn’t; to Henry she was the sun at the center of the world. “He lights up when I tell him you’re coming home, Rosie,” she promised often, dodging with a grin when Emma tried to slap her for using that nickname. “I tell him about all your escapades and he thinks you’re just about the neatest person in the whole realm.” To which Emma rolled her eyes, and Red laughed. “He asks for stories about you far more often than Sir Gom the Brave or Captain Crook legends.”

“And what do you tell him?” she returned dryly. “I hunt thieves and rapists for a living?”

“No,” Red said, matter of factly.

Emma tilted her head. “What do you tell him?”

Red smiled. “That you make the world safe.”

Emma snorted.

Red cuffed her chin and said, “What I mean is, you make his world safe.”

So Emma tried not to over-analyze the sensation of the warm, soft, fragile body in her arms, clinging to her like maybe Red was right. “I have to go, little knight,” she murmured in his hair.

Henry clutched her tighter and she chuckled. “I’ll make Granny promise two stories tonight, instead of one. How about that?”

Henry sat up and looked at her dubiously. “Really?”

“Yup,” Emma laughed.

He considered this for a moment, and Emma was sure she’d won until he buried himself back into her arms.

“One story, n’ you do it,” he said slyly, peeking up at her.

“Nice try.” Emma tapped his nose. “Tomorrow.” Despite his squeals of protest she dipped him onto the bed and wrapped him snugly in his blankets, for the night had a chill to it that had slipped beneath the windowpane. She stoked the coals of the fireplace and made Henry promise, as always, not to go near the flames. Usually he was too exhausted to even consider getting out of bed, but he was more lively tonight than Emma had seen him in a long time. She wished she could give him that story. But she was already running later than she’d planned and she wasn’t as good at stories as Granny, anyway.

“He’s tucked in,” she said to Red as she passed through the kitchen. She paused. “Tell Granny I promised him two stories.”

Red punched her arm lightly. “Softy.”

“Just make sure she delivers,” Emma said, unable to help the grin that cropped up at the corner of her mouth. “Or I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Red nodded seriously. “He is good at keeping score.”

The night was foggy and dismal when Emma left the warmth of the kitchen’s hearth and stepped onto the street. All the better, she supposed, for the man she hunted was big, much bigger than her, and the element of surprise could only serve her.

The town was large enough to be cut into four unofficial sectors. Red’s tavern, as the only upstanding establishment for food and board, occupied a place overlooking the market and made a profit selling lunch to the farming families who brought their wares to market on Sundays. It was considered a reputable place for travelers to spend a night or two, although Red’s main financial trouble was that travel had significantly slowed since the famine had prevented many Enchanted Forest folk from having the luxury to do light traveling in Garmir. Food was scarce, money was short, and even Garmir was beginning to feel the effects of their neighboring realm’s drought troubles.

But even in times of financial stress, no man ever had difficulty affording pleasure in the shadier parts of town, and this is where Emma headed now.

She was no stranger to the slums. There was a building around here that had once housed an orphanage, since disbanded, or moved or who knew——Emma didn’t. But it had been a roof to return to during freezing nights or summer rain. If you were lucky, there’d be something to eat. The old lady who used to run it, Emma didn’t remember her name, but she’d been kind and tried her best, and taken in children even when there was really no room. Which is probably what led to the flu running rampant that one summer and killing several of the littler or sicklier ones. It had taken the old lady with it too, and a son of hers came and ran the place for a while. But he’d lacked her compassion and made the children go out and beg, the older girls sell their bodies, things you saw in most orphanages around these parts, and which they’d been spared from for a while, thanks to the dead matriarch.

Emma didn’t come down around here much anymore, because it made her have these thoughts. Not just of her childhood, but of Henry, emaciated and begging in the square for a copper, shunted from bed to bed at the orphanage because there was no room and no one was willing to share. She knew how lucky she was, that Red’s was the tavern she stumbled into that night, pregnant and alone and cast out by a man who’d tricked her into loving him. It still terrified her, how close Henry had come to sharing her childhood fate.

It was good that she saw it once in a while. The trash in the streets, the smell of sewage. The straw roofs of the one-room, one-story buildings all crowded together, the only barrier between them the crumbling walls of clay bricks. It was a reminder that what she fought for was Henry and protecting him from all this. It gave her a reason to enter the Fish-Bone Inn at the edge of town and loiter along the side of the wall while she waited for a sign of her man.

When he lumbered into the bar with a scowl on his face, he looked even larger than the sketch of his face had led her to believe. But it was him. The burn scar on his neck, the silver loops in his ears. He clasped the hand of the bartender and they exchanged a tight hug. The bartender’s mouth moved but there was too much commotion for Emma to hear what he said.

“’Ello, little lady.”

A man with whiskey on his breath and kerchief round his neck sidled up to her; she breathed through her mouth and hissed, “Get lost, old man. Not on the market.”

A wounded look fell over the man’s face. “But darlin’,” he wheedled.

“But nothing.” She kept her line of sight on Grimm and sidestepped the drunken man, shoving a mug of booze into his hand before he could get his friends to join his sales pitch.

“Hey!” the man it belonged to cried, but she tossed him three pennies more than it was worth and he shrugged and grunted, letting her pass.

A sliver of light came from the right side of the bar, and that was where Grimm disappeared. Emma tipped the rim of her hat lower down her face and placed a few more pennies on the bar so that the bartender wouldn’t make a fuss. He clicked his tongue and shook his head. She sighed and pulled out a silver.

The bartender unlocked the gate that blocked the staircase from the general population; without a word Emma slipped through, and he closed it again behind her. Only one way up.

She nodded to the scantily-clad women that greeted her on the stairs. “Just passin’ through,” she murmured.

“Emma,” one of them said, but she held a finger to her lips. Couldn’t draw attention now, not when she was close.

But she pulled the woman aside by the elbow. “Hey, Lonnie. You know the Grimm fella?”

The girl snorted. “Oh, sure. Just came in. Sucker for the young lookin’ ones, gets off on pain. Pays well, though,” she added, looking thoughtful.

“You let him fool around with kids?” Emma hissed.

Lonnie looked offended. “A’ course not! I said young-lookin.”

“Never mind.” Emma shook her head. “What room’s he in?”

“Uh-uh.” Lonnie wagged her finger. “We gotta confidentiality agreement with the owner, s’why he lets us operate outa here.”

“Lon, listen. He was at Red’s tavern last night. Messed a girl up pretty bad.”

Lonnie frowned. “Red doesn’t do business over there.”

Emma bit her lip. “She thought she’d try it out. Taxes aren’t gettin’ lower. It was goin all right until this Grimm fella came hanging around last night. It was bad, Lon. Blood everywhere.”

“There always is, Emma. There always is.”

“No, Lonnie, listen.” Emma grabbed her hands and squeezed. They’d known each other in the old days. Not friends, exactly, but they’d share a scrap of bread if they had one. “This girl didn’t know what she was signing up for. He didn’t tell her anything. Left her bleeding out on Red’s floor.”

Lonnie shook her head. “He’s not the gentlest, I’ll be the first to admit it. But he knows the limits.”

“Maybe here he does.”

“What, and that wolf friend a’ yours couldn’t rough him up a bit?”

Emma smiled sadly. “She didn’t know what she was signing up for either. Please, Lonnie. How well does he pay? Is that what this is about?”

Lonnie shrugged out of Emma’s grip and wrapped her arms around herself. “The Missus likes him,” she whispered. “He pays all the extra fees she charges, for what he likes to do.”

Taking a gamble, Emma snapped open a pocket on the inside of her vest and removed the last gold coin that the Witch had paid her for Mork.

“In all the realms, Emma,” Lonnie gasped, eyes wide as saucers.

“Shhh.” Emma glanced behind them at the woman on the stairs, but they were talking amongst themselves with only the occasional, curious glance at Emma. She quickly folded the coin into Lonnie’s hands. “Buy yourself something nice. Like passage on the next caravan outta town.”

Lonnie’s hand shook as she clutched the gold coin, now hidden in her fist. “Emma, I——”

“What room, Lonnie?” Emma pleaded, taking the other woman gently by the shoulders. Lonnie took a deep breath and gestured, ever so faintly, with her head to the door in question.

((()))

Emma ushered Lonnie onto the steps and put a finger to her lips. Lonnie nodded and kissed her cheek, tucking the gold piece into her brassiere as she joined the other girls, plastering a smile on her face.

She pressed her ear to the door and heard noises that she wasn’t able to recognize as pleased or pained or both. Either way, she’d be interrupting the rendezvous before it reached whatever twisted completion Grimm was after.

But first she knocked on the door. Hoping the man would make it easy and come to her.

Instead a girl propped open the door.

Not really a girl. But she looked it. Heart-shaped face and perfect curves, big round eyes that reminded Emma of the pout Henry wore when his desert was taken away.

“Got a paying customer here, miss,” the girl said.

“Right…are you…OK?”

“Fine,” the girl said. “Wanna tell me why you’re interrupting the hour my client paid for?”

Emma cast around, stared the girl up and down, searching for a sign that something was amiss.

“Look, if he touches you——”

The girl laughed. “That’s kinda the point, darlin. Go get in line, you’ll have your turn.”

The door slammed.

Emma growled and slapped her hand against the wall.

“You’re wasting your time.”

A new voice, sultry and knowing. A woman stood there, wearing a robe that cut off at her thighs. It was the most expensive item Emma had seen since entering the establishment.

The woman nodded at the door. “Talli requests him, you know. She likes it——the pay, anyway.” The woman grinned. “Though between you and me, I think she gets off on the other stuff a little bit, too.”

“He’s hired her before?”

“All the time…might be why he went crawling ;round Red’s place. Needed a change of scenery.”

“You heard about that?”

“Everyone heard about that.” She patted Emma’s shoulder as she passed, and Emma could feel eyes continue to study her. But she had gotten the two things she’d come for; confirmation of Grimm’s location, and that whatever girl he’d booked for the night was safe. Relatively.

With that, she slipped down the hallway towards the back exit, and at the last minute swerved let into an empty room, furnished with a mattress, no bed frame, and an oil lamp. Men took their pleasure cheap at the Fish-Bone.

She closed the door to signal it was occupied and knelt eye-level to the keyhole, breathing through her mouth so as not to inhale the stench of trash beneath the window outside. There’d been a time in her life that she hadn’t even noticed the smell of rot that Emma up all around here. It was a smell that had resided in every pore of her skin. Sometimes she woke up in the middle of the night, curled up in her attic bedroom, with the ghost of that scent all around her, and a steel-toed boot in her ribs. A man’s grunt as he climbed on top of her and she pretended to like it while she thought, this is love, and was grateful he’d returned to her that night instead of finding some other girl’s bed to warm.

She shook her head and pictured Henry, healthy and whole, his wide green eyes that looked like hers, and his glossy brown hair that did not. She pictured the burlap pouch of glittering coins. Red would get some, of course, and Emma would finally be able to consider that debt paid. And then, as soon as Henry was well, she could whisk him off somewhere, a seashore or the brisk, cool mountains, and she could build a house for them. The fresh clear air would fill him up and coax back his rosy cheeks and plump baby tummy. Red and Granny could come, if they wanted to. There was surely enough to sustain them all, and when it ran out they could live off the land. No longer would they be subject to rising taxes or the increasing hostility sat the border. The threat of war and famine would become a fog in Henry’s mind, memories of another life, too distant to discern the shape of.

A heavy press of boots thudded in the hallway, proceeded by the giggling hush of a woman’s voice. Emma snapped to attention and pressed her face to the keyhole, and by the dim gas lamps in the hall she made out the coattails of a man retreating. Instead of going back the way he’d come, Grimm meant to use the girls’ entrance on the other end of the building. Cracking open the door, Emma slipped out as soon as he’d made his exit and followed.

A narrow staircase rocked beneath her feet as she crept down the stairs after Grimm. He was already on the street by the time she reached the bottom.

Ducking down a parallel alley, she scrambled onto the thatched roof of the house at the end and perched on the edge.

But when she peered over the side, Grimm wasn’t there. She swore and flattened herself on the roof, then rolled to the other side, but here was deserted as well.

She was calculating her next move when the softest rustle disturbed the thatch.

He could mute his footsteps, but not his heavy breathing, and not the fierce odor of sex and booze. She twisted onto her back and kicked her feet up, aiming for his groin. But her boot made a clapping sound against his thigh, and he barely reacted.

He did rock backwards to avoid another blow, and it gave Emma the momentum she needed to pitch to her feet and square off.

“I know you, bitch,” he growled, crouching low to the ground.

Emma had never seen the man in her life, but she supposed he might associate her with Red and the Sitting Duck.

But that’s not what he said. “You’re Bael’s whore.”

All the breath left Emma in a whoosh, even before Grimm pounced on her and pinned her to the roof. The scratchy straw scraped the nape of her neck. Eyes blown wide, she watched him on top of her, willing her body into action.

“You don’t remember me,” Grimm laughed. “But I remember you. Pining after him all the damn time.” He spit to the side of her head. “You were the pregnant whore.”

Emma snarled and flipped him onto his stomach, pressing his head into the dirt, where he sputtered and coughed but still resisted her hold until she felt with her fingers at the base of his neck and dug her thumb into a pressure point. “This is a trick Bael showed me,” she growled in his ear.

He whimpered and went limp, but Emma, knowing better than to think as man as big as him had passed out so quickly, dug her finger harder into his skin and waited.

Finally she sat up on her knees, breathing hard, and wrangled his wrists into a thick rope, the ends of which she tied into a complicated knot that even Grimm at his most coherent should have had trouble breaking loose from. Another trick Bael had showed her. She closed her eyes and breathed through her nose. She hadn’t heard that name spoken in three years. He’d come for Henry once, but Red very thoroughly warned him away from coming within twenty steps of the front door. She didn’t like going wolf, but she’d done it for them. To protect them.

Bael hadn’t actually wanted Henry to keep, though. Emma knew him at least that well. He’d wanted to gloat——the fruit of his loins, or whatever. But he hadn’t tried again and left town soon after as quietly as he’d come into it and turned Emma’s life upside down, a year before.

She maneuvered Grimm onto his back and dragged him into the shadows of an alley, where she could figure out how best to haul him back to the Witch.

((()))

This time the illusion shuddered and collapsed on it own when it sensed her presence, as the Witch had assured her would be the case.

She’d regrettably had to leave a sizable lump on Grimm’s skull when he awoke from his stupor despite both his arms and legs being bound. But the rest of the return journey had passed without incident and when she reached the end of the long tunnel the Witch was waiting for her. She stood from her position in an alcove that might’ve been a guard’s post if this was a normal dungeon in a normal Keep.

She was struck again with the very real strangeness of her situation. Contracting with witches for hoards of gold the likes of which all the people she knew put together had never seen. And in return, leaving these men, these really very ordinary thugs and bastards, to whatever ill fate awaited them.

She wasn’t stupid. She couldn’t bring herself to believe that the Witch was some crusader set out to rid the town of crime but arbitrarily extracting men who had purportedly committed it. They had a sheriff for that. Besides, if the Witch was so devoted to vigilante justice, why did she need Emma? Plausible deniability?

A chill pricked the back of her neck. Was that what this was? Was the Witch setting her up to take the fall for whatever was really going on here? She considered all the people who had seen her tonight asking asfter Grimm, following him straight up the staircase of that whorehouse. For a price——probably not even a very high one——they’d happily vouch for her presence there that night, if people noticed the man’s disappearance and starting asking questions. He wasn’t well-liked but he was loud and burly and noticeable. Mork had been little more than a highwayman, a nomad with few connections to register his absence. But Grimm came from around these parts. And if her work for the Witch continued…someone was bound to notice locals getting picked off and vanishing without a trace.

Strange things abounded in Garmir. Human shapeshifters, a thousand year old sorcerer. A rogue Witch.

But men didn’t just disappear without explanation.

So after she’d handed the man over to the Witch and watched him collapse with a groan into one of the cells, she blurted, “What are you doing to them?”

The Witch, whose hand had been outstretched with Emma’s payment, withdrew. Emma watched the gold with agony. But she kept her resolve and waited. The more she met with the Witch, the less catlike her face seemed. The more human. And easier to look at without flinching, which she did until the Witch shifted in discomfort before collecting herself with a frown.

“I pay you to be discreet and not ask questions,” she said. “Was there something unclear about the terms of our contract?”

Emma bit down on her tongue. She shouldn’t push it. She shouldn’t.

“I just figure,” she said. “If I’m gonna be involved in whatever creepy, mysterious stuff you’re doin’ to these guys, I should at least know what it is I’m aiding and abetting. That’s all.”

“That’s not all, Miss Swan,” the Witch sneered, curling the name on her tongue. “You know not what you ask, or you would not ask it.”

“I figure that’s for me to decide, ain’t it?”

Absently, the Witch dribbled each gold coin from one hand to another. Except there was nothing absent about it and her eyes narrowed into catlike slits again while Emma stared desperately at the money.

“If you wish to be released from my service,” she said. “Speak now. I will pay half of what you earned tonight.”

“Excuse me?”

“And keep the other half for wasting my time.”

Emma’s chest ballooned in frustration. She wasn’t willing to make an exit strategy just yet. “You won’t tell me anything? At least if you’re hurting them——killing them?”

“I can’t tell you that, Miss Swan,” the Witch said softly.

“Why? Because it’s true?”

“Because it would violate the terms of your service,” she snapped. “As you are doing by asking at all.”

Emma pitched back on her heels sullenly. She was thinking about the gold. Henry and the cottage in the mountains.

After a few moments, the Witch asked, “So, Miss Swan. Do I still have you in my employ, or shall I find another?”

Emma studied Grimm’s prostrate body.

“I am not a patient woman, Miss Swan,” the Witch snapped. “Time is not a luxury I have.”

“I’ll do it,” Emma grit out.

“Good.” She sounded inexplicably pleased.

“But I want double what I’ve been getting——per body,” she added.

“Done.”

“Done?”

“Money is no issue for me, Miss Breer, as you may have noticed.”

“…Right.”

The Witch flicked her wrist and the number of coins in her palm multiplied. Emma stared at them suspiciously. “Are those real?”

“I used magic to summon them, not make them,” the Witch said with an irritated frown. “If you find my words to be untrue, you know where to find me. What good would it do, scamming you out of a handful of gold?”

“What indeed,” Emma muttered, thinking of all the people she knew who would kill for that kind of money. Literally. Including the man who was starting to stir in the cell at their feet.

“Go,” the Witch said, following her gaze to Grimm’s body as he shuffled to his knees with a groan.

Emma’s hand could barely contain all eight of the gold pieces as she stumbled back down the passage. She searched her her pockets and found an old, stained handkerchief of Granny’s, which she tossed on the ground to make room for the coins. She could buy Granny as many embroidered replacements as she wanted, from the most expensive stall in the market.

She did not get far enough away fast enough——that or even concussed and disoriented, Grimm could put up a hell of a fight. The noises of a struggle echoed down the passage from the direction she had come. Deep, male grunts and then a gasp that could have belonged to either of them.

She squeezed her hands into fists. Grimm was a monster, and the Witch a stunted creature in humanoid form. What was it to her if they destroyed each other?

But she had a single thought as she turned to go back: if Grimm had truly gotten the better of the her, the Witch would need help.

She should have known better. She should have just kept walking.

In the dungeon, Grimm was on his knees, clutching his chest and sucking in sharp, noisy claps of air.

Emma didn’t feel entirely distraught at seeing the man so utterly pathetic and defeated.

Standing over him was the Witch. The space around her vibrated with glowing, red energy. In her hands was a heart.

A pulsing, beating heart that emanated waves of magic that sent Emma crashing against the wall. Her throat constricted but she couldn’t look away, couldn’t remember how to breathe to move or think.

The Witch stared down at the heart in triumph. She squeezed it every so slightly and Grimm cried out in pain.

“Shut up, you pathetic weasel,” the Witch snapped. “Or you’ll meet a fate worse than this.”

Grimm scrambled backwards as though to seek shelter in the cradle of the wall, but the Witch squeezed again; he whimpered and gasped, gleaming with sweat, ponytail of scraggly brown hair thrown asunder. Bloated and red as he sobbed at the feet of the Witch.

“What was that?”

Grimm had spoken. The Witch leaned forward to hear it. Emma leaned forward too.

“No…fate worse,” Grimm rasped.

The Witch shrugged. “Debatable, I assure you.”

“Kill me,” Grimm begged. “Put it back or kill me.”

“That would defeat the purpose, I’m afraid.”

“What…you want with it?” Grimm panted.

“With this?” The Witch stroked the heart and it seemed to strain towards her, its light collapsing around her features. “To make a new world.”  
  
The red light flailed out in tendrils to wrap around Grimm, compelling him back to his knees. His hung his head and cried in earnest, rocking back and forth. The Witch showed no sympathy; her eyes glowed so bright her pupils disappeared, and with a whimper Emma pressed her face against the wall.

The Witch snapped her head in the direction of the tunnel. “Who trespasses here?” she demanded, and Emma couldn’t make herself small enough to escape the radius of light as it washed over her.

She expected to be smote where she stood. She’d always imagined that she’d die young. Not quite like this. But in an alley somewhere, throat slit at the hands of a man not unlike Grimm. For sex or food or money. She didn’t know which one this was. What else was there?

“Emma,” the Witch snarled. “I told you to leave.”

“I heard…fighting,” Emma mumbled. “I thought…”

“You _thought. G_et out, Emma.”

Emma didn’t move.

“Get out!” the Witch snapped. “Before I change my mind!” Another blast of light burst from the heart. Unadulterated magic still warm from the body.

Emma finally found her mobility then, and scrambled out of the radius of light. Immediately her body cooled and softened. But the Witch was still watching her. “If you tell anyone what you have seen here——”

“I won’t.”

“_If you tell anyone what you have seen here_,” the Witch said sharply. “You will be worse than no use to me. You will be a threat. Do you understand?”

Emma nodded and backed away without taking her eyes off that ring of magic as it pursued her down the tunnel.

“Do you understand?”

“Yeah, I understand!”

Emma shrieked in pain as the light struck her once, quickly, like a lightning bolt, before retreating. It continued to herd her until finally, she turned her back and fled.

The passage seemed to wind and curl in ways it hadn’t before, and she stumbled blindly through the dark. She fell once and scraped her hands on sharp pebbles, but barely heeded the pain in her haste to get as far away from that place as possible.

Finally, she burst out into the cool night air. Her knees hit the ground and she sobbed into the soft grass. It felt cool against the abrasions on her hands, and the blistered skin where the magic had struck her. She allowed herself this brief reprieve before drying her eyes on her sweat-soaked vest and getting to her feet.

The illusion once more covered the mouth of the tunnel, though this time Emma doubted she would have been allowed through it if she’d tried. Not that she had any intention of doing so. Obviously. She’d learned her lesson about doing business with witches.

On the walk home she tried to process what she had seen. Hearts. The Witch was after hearts. Why, she had no idea, except that they held power, and maybe that was enough. Power was the other thing people killed for.

She had the faint impression that this was something she should report. She pictured the sheriff, a gruff man fairly adept at swordplay but who had never seen actual combat beyond corralling the local drunks behind metal bars to sleep it off for the night.

But what would snitching do besides get her in trouble with the Witch? How could a pot-belly sheriff who treated swords like playthings and drunkards as buddies, face off against that kind of power? How could anyone?

Suddenly she ached to be home. Her body was still swore from the tussle with Grimm, and throbbing from her confrontation with the Witch.

She went straight to Henry’s bedroom when she straggled through the door. Red was already awake, prepping breakfast, a porridge spiced with cinnamon and apples that made Emma’s mouth water and her stomach flip over on itself in equal measure. Thirsty. Her throat was parched and swallowing was difficult, but she bypassed all these desires for the most pressing one.

Henry was snoring in bed; he snored because he had trouble breathing at night, even propped up on several pillows so his chest had room to expand. But to Emma, just then, his snores were the most beautiful ballad she’d ever heard. She didn’t go near the bed. She slid to the floor and sat against the wall and listened too her son exhale unevenly, imagining the concave of his chest as he did so, and then the filling up of his lungs with air, the sharp, short snore that betrayed his body’s struggle.

And as she did, she made up her mind. The Witch could play with people’s souls by herself, and Emma would bottle up everything she’d seen. Not a word, not even to Red. Eight gold coins still made her pocket sag with their delightful weight. You could do a lot with eight pieces of gold. Maybe not flee to the mountains, but she could cover Henry’s doctor and medicines for years if she bartered and budgeted the right way.

Resigned and relieved, she closed her eyes and rested her head on her knees, and fell asleep to the lullaby of her son’s breathing.


	6. Chapter Six

Regina braced herself against the wall until her breathing evened out and the heart’s glow softened, until the circumference of light barely extended past her fingers and the rest of the dungeon was buried in darkness.

She whispered a few words that would send Grimm to sleep. Poor man. She’d actually felt some pity for him in those last minutes. But she needed the hearts. She could just as easily take them from a child or a family man or a monk or a prostitute, but none of them deserved it.

She wasn’t sure even bastards like Grimm deserved it. But if she had to take hearts, she’d prefer to take them from men like this, whose capacity for empathy had been taken over by selfishness and greed and lust, and whose presence in the world threatened innocents.

It was regrettable about Miss Swan, but not unexpected. She’d hoped to have a little more time before Emma became too inquisitive for her own good, but she’d underestimated the girl’s moral compass. In another circumstance, Regina might have considered her actions admirable. In this case they were only a hindrance.

But no matter. She had to act quickly, while the life force of the heart was most potent. She confirmed that Grimm was unconscious and that the sleeping spell would sustain itself to the very end. Then she placed the heart gently in a velvet pouch and pulled the drawstring closed. At once she was cast entirely into darkness.

Heart in hand, she left Grimm in his stupor on the floor and made the journey up several flights of steps to her tower. She carried the heart to the windowsill where her succulents were on the verge of bloom. Their little buds swelled in the direction of the sunrise. If Regina left them to their own devices, they would flourish under the light of the sun and sky like any other growing thing. They’d be beautiful on their own, she had no doubt. Plants were one category of thing that she generally had no trouble keeping safe and alive.

But she wasn’t nurturing her own personal garden simply for the aesthetic pleasure of it, although she certainly could have used some of that in this old musty Keep, which after almost ten years she still wasn’t allowed to leave.

She closed her eyes; that had been the other benefit of having Emma around, as it was likely she would have been sympathetic to her cause. Stealing hearts aside, of course. Now Emma had seen too much and it was too late.

She could have resorted to wiping Emma’s memory, Regina mused, but that was the sort of low trick her mother or the Dark One would have used, and Emma, despite her rough edges, was technically an innocent in all of this. Besides, that spell had a long history of going awry, and the woman hardly deserved to have her brain scrambled.

If Emma didn’t keep her words, and rumors began to abound, then she would resort to that sort of drastic measure. But as long as the contract held, and even now it did, since Emma had not officially renounced it in the presence of Regina and a witness, she was obligated to uphold her end as well.

When she’d first come to live as the Dark One’s apprentice, he had allowed her one excursion out of the Keep, accompanied by himself and on the ground that she not attempt to escape. Regina, being angry and distraught by her sudden position as what amounted to the Dark One’s prisoner, foolishly made the promise as though it were nothing. The walls of the Keep were protected by strong and ancient magic that had been in place since the Dark One took up residence millennium before.

At the time Regina knew no more of magic than any peasant child, beyond the fact that she hated it with every particle of her being and had sworn never to become beholden to it.

She plotted her escape as best as any seventeen-year-old, pampered daughter of a lord could have, but of course it didn’t matter. The Dark One had magic and she did not. He dragged her back to the KLeep and threw her in a room so potent with magic it nearly killed her, scorching her internal organs and burning her flesh.

It had been both punishment and lesson, the Dark One’s twisted way of teaching her that magic was powerful and had consequences.

After a day and night she’d been freed from the chamber, but the Dark One, who could have easily eased her pain, made Regina learn the magic to heal herself.

That was another rule of magic; it generally worked best at times that you were motivated by some external force or needed to take drastic measures.

SO in a month she had learned a spell that normally took novices at least a year, and that might’ve spoken to her natural talent, which of course it did, but also was influenced by the endless days of pain upon pain, the bout of pneumonia, the inability to swallow even water without wanting to cry.

Through it all, the Dark One cackled and sang smugly how necessity is the greatest teacher of all, as if he had done her a favor.

Which, perhaps, he had. She no longer feared pain.

No more deals with the Dark One, after that.

Her tower was the highest point of the Keep, and from its window she could see the village, the valley and the well tread caravan paths that meandered off into the woods. She could access none of it. She was still as trapped as ever, until such time as the Dark One considered her training complete.

She was beginning to think that day would never come. The Dark One knew as well as she that her powers had started to rival his, and he was clever and cunning; he could keep her here forever to prevent Regina emerging as a challenger.

Of course, her interest in escape was secondary these days. She would have liked to be able to come and go as she pleased, and she’d told the Dark One as much, to no avail, but fleeing the Keep would no longer have been in her best interest anyway. She had access to hundreds of spells and potions ingredients, and all the time in the world to devote to her studies. She hadn’t asked for it but Cora and the Dark One had placed a weapon directly into her hands, and she was going to put it to good use even if they destroyed her in the end.

There was a land of people starving on the other side of the border. A drought that had wiped out entire species of crops, rendered old wheat fields virtual deserts. She knew the queen and king had exhausted every favor or debt owed to them, and emergency stores had been emptied of the last, singular grain.

She knew if she went up against her mother it would kill her. Even if her plan succeeded, Cora wouldn’t rest until Regina was once and for all brought under subjugation. And Regina was prepared to die before that happened.

She set aside the pouch with held the heart, and took a minute to arrange the mechanism she had improvised, a sort of sack and tube, the ends of which she inserted into each of the four pots. Then she delicately took the heart in hand and transferred it to the sack. Then, through four pinpricks in the sack, she inserted the other ends of the tubes, which contained sharp needles.

Four prongs, stabbing the core of the heart and drawing its energy into the hungry roots of each vibrant green shrub.

She had deliberated for a long time what species of plant would best serve her purposes. She’d been drawn to the flashier, cultivated garden flowers, of course, but reluctantly admitted they were too ostentatious. She’d thought of her girlhood and the hours she had spent in the woods, and the decision of the soft, small purple and white wildflowers was easy after that. And fitting, she felt, with satisfaction, that the little wildflowers which she had loved so much in her childhood were to help bring about the breaking of her mother’s curse.

The wildflowers accepted the gift of life joyously; Regina could practically see their little green stalks perk up. For a moment the veins of each leaf glowed red as it absorbed the heart’s energy into itself. The most powerful energy that existed in all the realms, for the spell that Regina intended to cast.

She stood and watched until the heart drained dry, and tried not to think of Grimm, down in the dungeon, flickering in and out of consciousness as he spasmed and struggled and finally took his last breath.

((()))

“It’s been a half hour,” Red said to Emma, which meant it was time for someone to check on Henry.

“I’ll go.” Emma untied her apron and tossed it on the bar. She paused. “Do you have anything sweet?”

Henry’s appetite was practically nonexistent these days, but sometimes she could coax him with one of Granny’s candies or pastries.

Red shrugged and shook her head. “Sorry, someone slept in this morning.” She raised her eyebrow at her grandmother, who sat knitting by the fire in her rocking chair, which Emma had carried down from her bedroom.

“Don’t deny an old woman her vices,” Granny said, although she hadn’t given any indication she could hear Emma and Red talking on the other side of the room, and she didn’t take her eyes off her knitting.

Emma smirked at Red. Busted. Red flicked her with a wet towel and Emma laughed, and it felt good to laugh. It wasn’t something she done often, as of late. She’d thought, with the gold, all their woes would vanish. But a heavy storm had crushed the roof above the kitchen, destroying one of the ovens and two stove surfaces. Emma couldn’t in good conscience hoard the money, not after everything Red and Granny had done for her. Never mind the fact that the kitchen was all of their livelihoods.

Without the gold they would have been ruined. As it was, Emma had to part with two of her gold pieces to fix the kitchen and the roof. Red had smacked a kiss on her cheek and cried the day the work was finished and the kitchen stood sparkling new, better than it had ever looked before.

“You’ve saved us,” Red whispered in her ear, and Emma had felt a glowing in her chest. Frankly, she spent a lot of her time ruining other people’s lives, even if they were awful bastards and deserved it. It was nice to feel like she’d saved something, for once.

Especially because now she felt like she had to atone for what she’d done to Grimm and Mork. Sure, lots of her guys ended up on the gallows, but that was after they’d had their due process with the law. The sheriff was a fair man, and often sentenced life in prison rather than a hanging if it came to that. No one deserved their fate decided at the claws of a Witch.

And now it seemed to all have been for naught. Two months ago she had fled the Witch’s dungeon. Two months ago she had sent for the doctor, who didn’t have a name for Henry’s elusive illness, but had given them his strongest elixir and prescribed one spoonful twice a day, in the morning and evening with meals. Red called him a kook behind his back, but she had no better alternatives and Emma was out of options. She gave up two more gold pieces, one for the examination and one for a year’s supply of the elixir. The doctor assured them that they would see a change in Henry within the first week, and they did.

Her son took to meeting them downstairs for breakfast before anyone came up to fetch him. He had a voracious appetite and slowly built his strength back up throwing a leather ball with Emma in the yard. His legs were wobbly from lack of use, but he resisted being carried, and for half a month Emma trailed after him wherever he went, ready to catch him if his skinny little legs stopped holding him up. He insisted on helping Red and Granny in the kitchen, mostly baking sweets, of course; and during the dinner rush, he scrambled up and over legs and laps in his eagerness to pass out utensils and napkins to the patrons who soon smiled fondly when they saw him, and admitted to Emma that they hadn’t known she had a son.

That was in the beginning. Then Henry’s spark started to fade. It was small things first, a desire to sleep in past breakfast, which they attributed to his late nights hanging around the tavern. When he did emerge he ate all his meals and medicine and happily so——Granny had a trick for adding strawberry juices and extra sugar to the elixir to mask the taste.

Then he stopped making his rounds during the dinner rush. Instead, he sat in Granny’s lap by the fire and asked for a story, snuggling into her and content to lie still and let her crackly old voice lull him to sleep.

“The novelty wore off,” Red suggested, with a shrug, when she caught Emma studying her son from the kitchen doorway.

Emma bit her lip and didn’t respond. She took Henry to bed and checked his temple and cheeks, but he squirmed away and insisted, “M’fine Mama.” He patted her cheeks until she stopped her examination, and she was charmed into bed for goodnight cuddles.

All was not fine the next morning. Henry ran a fever and played deliriously with his mother’s fingers as he sat in her lap and cried. He took his medicine but refused to eat. Emma was afraid to break him, she had always been afraid to break him, from the moment he was born. But Red said, “He needs you now,” and Emma didn’t like the ominous sound of those words, so she went up to his room and let him decide what he wanted. Which in the end was just to be held.

All the progress of those first few weeks waned as if it had never happened at all. Emma had just started to feel the knot in her chest loosening, her breaths coming more easily, but her peaceful interlude was shattered as Henry seemed to get worse than ever.

The doctor returned, this time wearing a mask, and admitted again that he had no idea what could be ailing the boy. Emma sent him away, her lips tight with scorn, and called for the doctor in the town over. But the assessment was the same. _It’s not the flu, it’s not pneumonia, his blood looks healthy, I don’t see any signs of infection. The elixir should have fought off the fever._

“It should have,” Emma had mocked. “But it didn’t. So what are you going to do about it?” Red had shushed her and placed a warning hand on her shoulder, but she, too, stared at the doctor with battle in her eyes.

The doctor had softened. “I’m sorry, my dear. You say he has been sick for a long time?”

Emma nodded. Her chest tightened; tears thickened in her eyes. She swatted them away angrily and stared at her feet until she stopped having the urge to cry.

“It’s my fault,” she said to Red later on, unable to meet her friend’s eyes. “It’s my fault. I didn’t want him. I wanted him to go away, when I found out. And now he’s here and I’m getting my wish.”

“That’s nonsense,” Red said, the epitome of practicality. “The world doesn’t work that way, it’s not keeping score.”

“How do you know?” Emma muttered sullenly.

“Because bad things happen to good people and it’s just bad luck, it’s all random. No one made Henry sick.”

“What if it was me? What if it was something in my body that he was born with? I grew up around all sorts of toxic garbage——”

“And plenty of babies are born and grow up in that same district every day and they don’t get sick. Not like this, anyway. You did everything right, Emma. You did nothing wrong.” She wrapped her arms around Emma’s shoulders, and Emma could think of many, many things she had done wrong. Trusting Henry’s birth father, for starters. But she was tired, she was so, so tired, so she had let Red shush her and console her, and when she had composed herself she brought his medicine up to Henry’s room and slept in his bed, curled up next to him, until he complained she was making him too hot. So then she went downstairs and out to the ice-house, where she chipped off several slices into a bucket and spent the rest of the night caressing his head with the ice wrapped up in a rag from the kitchen.

And so it had gone for over a month now; Emma still futilely gave him his medicine twice a day as instructed by the ‘kook’ doctor, but with two opinions now telling her that her son was beyond help, she did so out of routine rather than hope. She’d taken to sleeping wrapped in blankets on the floor of his bedroom, with an ice bucket on hand if he woke up and cried. He was always worse at night. She lay on the hard floor and listened to him breathing. She didn’t sleep unless Red discovered her there and insisted on standing vigil so that Emma could get a few hours of sleep.

She gave her son everything he wanted, which wasn’t much, because he didn’t ask for anything. Not food or toys. He wanted ice, mostly. Or for Mama to hold him. Emma had probably snuggled him more in the last month than she had the first two years of his life. She’d been so frightened in the beginning, and desperate. She was the last person who should have been anywhere near a baby, drunk with misery as she had been half the time, and in a depressed stupor for the rest of it. If it hadn’t been for Granny and Red, she didn’t know what would have happened. Henry’s childhood probably wouldn’t have looked too different from her own.

Today was a good day; Henry sat up in bed when he saw her and even mustered a smile.

“Hello kid,” she said weakly, and he reached out in anticipation of her arms around him. It made Emma want to scream no. It was as good as her fault that he was sick. Everything around her fell to dust. Everything around her became battered and broken, trees crashed through a roof that had stood for a hundred years, men had their hearts ripped literally out of their chests, and her little boy was dying even though he was the last person in the whole world who deserved it.

But she couldn’t refuse him anything anymore, so she climbed onto the bed and propped herself against the pillows. She watched him consider the journey from his side of the bed to her lap. His brows furrowed. He wanted so badly to make it there on his own. Her heart ached at the struggle on his face. Finally she couldn’t bear it anymore and gathered him up despite his little whimper of protest, and bundled him against her chest. She hadn’t nursed him when he was a baby and she regretted it now. She squeezed her eyes against the memory of how she’d practically rejected him, how he probably would have died if Red and Granny hadn’t taken him under their wing without question. Was that it? A baby grew strong by the nutrients in their mother’s milk. Had she cursed him from the start by not even trying to bond with him?

She imagined that this was what nursing would have felt like, if she had ever nursed him; Henry nestled up to her chest, breath on her neck. Except that he wasn’t the plump, jolly baby he’d been at the beginning. He was skinny and too hot. Emma stroked his back with the tips of her fingers like she knew he liked. It was the only type of caress that wouldn’t cause his skin to overheat. Even like this, with his body resting lightly against her, he’d soon start to wiggle and squirm and whine, and she’d have to lay him back on his side of the bed and go find the ice bucket.

But for a moment he was content, and she touched her nose to his temple and inhaled. She didn’t start to cry until the smell of sickness overrode his baby smell, and her eyes burned with salty tears.

Henry, of course, bright, inquisitive, wonderful little Henry, noticed immediately when she couldn’t resist the tight quiver in her shoulders. He gathered the strength to lift his head and look at her, and his own eyes bubbled when he reached up to touch the wet tracks down her face. “Why cryin’, Ma?” he asked, pulling his sticky hand back and staring at it in wonder. His brow crinkled in concern and that broke the last of Emma’s resolve; her chest heaved as she keened once, low and long, and tears spilled from her eyes, and she cried harder than she could ever remember crying in her whole life. Henry, not understanding, and scared by the sight of his mother’s tears, started crying too, and that’s the sight Red discovered a while later when she came up to check on them.

Henry soon passed out from exhaustion, but Emma continued to rock him and cry while Red rubbed her back and cooed soothingly for the both of them.

((()))

Emma woke up in a terror that night. She reached blindly across the bed and found Henry’s body, still warm. She lit a small piece of wax and watched his chest rise and fall. Watched him breathe. Watched him live for one more minute, then the next, then the next, and every minute he lived convinced her that he’d live one more, but she still couldn’t go back to sleep or even look away.

She sagged against the bed-frame and blinked furiously each time her eyes fell with the drag of unconsciousness. She tucked her knees up to her chin and rocked herself back and forth, fighting to stay awake so she could sit vigil over him for the rest of the long night.

The candle drip drip dripped wax down her hands; it steamed against her skin and she hissed, shaking her hand on reflex before it could dry. Still, an angry red mark was left behind in the nook between her thumb and forefinger, and she stuck it in her mouth as if she could suck the pain right out of her body.

“Maaa,” whined a little voice.

“Shh, shh, I’m sorry, shh.” Emma brushed a strand of hair from Henry’s face and resumed stroking his back until he curled up closer to her and fell again into the rare heavy sleep that signaled the pain had relinquished him for a little while, and for once he dozed in peace. Even when his breathing evened out——as much as it ever did, the way his lungs were filled with fluid——she continued to make soft shushing noises.

When she woke there was a man standing over them. She squeaked and lunged out of bed, positioning herself in between Henry and the stranger. “What!” she sputtered, and though her words were thick with confusion, her body was already settling into a fighting stance.

“Emma, it’s ok!” Red rushed into the room and latched onto her arm. “Hey, it’s ok,” she soothed. “I asked him to come. He’s a city doctor, Emma.”

City doctor.

Oh. That meant he had access to real medical training. Real techniques. The most updated knowledge and technology.

Breathing hard, Emma studied him; he had a hooked nose and long, light brown hair that was pulled back in a ponytail. He wore a shirt and long-coat of silver and blue, which probably cost as much as the tavern made in a year. His features were odd, even ugly, but his eyes held a gentleness in them that Emma decided to trust. He certainly couldn’t make things any worse. But even then, she didn’t dare imagine that he’d have a cure——a temporary treatment that would give them a couple extra months, maybe. A year at most, that she’d get to keep Henry with her.

“May I examine the boy?” the doctor asked softly.

“Ma?” Henry mumbled from the depths of the mattress. Emma twisted around and smiled at him, though she knew it didn’t reach her eyes, and Henry, perceptive as ever, frowned between her and the doctor.

“This is a doctor from far away,” Emma said, swallowing down the lump in her throat. “A whole other land.”

“Enchan’ed Forest?” Henry guessed in a whisper.

The doctor chuckled and nodded. “Indeed. Henry, your friend, Red, has told me so much about you.” He paused. “In fact, I brought you a gift…” He ducked out of sight and rummaged in his bag on the floor. Henry, though his eyes were glassy with exhaustion and fever, perked up enough to lift his head and watch the doctor search for something in the depths of his tool kit. Emma sat behind him on the bed and supported his head.

She would have liked to think he would not be so won over by a stranger bringing him presents, but then, sometimes she forgot how young he really was. And how few gifts she had ever been able to afford to give him. He had a few raggedy dolls and second-hand toys, but he’d outgrown many of them, except for a small, stitched teddy that had taken up residence on the end of the bed. Henry had put him there so that they could still see each other, but “he won’t ged sick from me,” which of course had made Emma want to scream and cry and throw something out the window.

She didn’t get angry anymore. She cried; she was silent and resigned. She was too tired to rage at the world these days.

The doctor emerged from his bag of treasures with a beautiful hand-carved wooden boat, which he presented to Henry. Her son quivered with excitement as he stared at it; he looked at Emma, as though asking for permission. She nodded and felt his little body practically explode as he offered his own hands to accept the gift.

It wasn’t until the doctor, with a heavy, solemn look in his eyes, was doing a precursory examination that Emma realized the true meaning of the gift.

Henry was dying. And there was nothing this doctor or anyone else could do about it.

She fled the room, ignoring Henry’s confused, “Ma?”

She positioned herself against the wall, directly next to the doorway, where she could hear everything that the doctor said, but Henry wouldn’t be able to see her tears.

Red said, “Be right back Hen-Hen,” and slipped out of the room. She held Emma’s shoulders tightly and shook her. “Look at me,” she demanded. Emma shook her head and buried her face in Red’s shoulder. “Hey,” Red said again, pushing Emma away and forcing her chin up. “I’m not giving up, you hear me? We’re not giving up.”

“Why would you bring him here?” Emma whispered. “Why would you make me hope? I’d already accepted——” She sobbed into her fist and wrapped her arm around her torso. Red shook her head and pulled Emma into a fierce embrace.

“No,” she snapped. “None of that.” Pulling back, she instructed, “Stay here. I’ll talk the doctor. I’ll handle it, ok?”

Emma sniffed and nodded, wiping mucus from her top lip. Red rolled her eyes and fished a handkerchief out of her pocket. “Here.”

Sliding to the floor and holding the handkerchief to her face——it smelled like cinnamon and Granny——Emma eavesdropped through the wall between the hallway and Henry’s bedroom. The doctor said something that made Henry giggle; Red asked if there was something to ease his breathing and the doctor suggested a cream they could rub on his chest before he went to sleep. He approved of Emma’s ice chips but urged them to keep Henry under several layers of blankets. “He’ll feel hot, and want to take them off, but his body isn’t properly regulating heat on its own. Makes sure he stays covered.”

“Your Ma will be right back in, ok?” Red murmured to Henry. “I have to go talk to the doctor.”

“Bout me?”

Red laughed.

Emma couldn’t help a little smile. He was too smart for his own good.

“About boring grown up things,” Red assured. “Stay here, sugar plum.”

Red and the doctor exited the room.

“Going back in yet?” Red asked Emma quietly.

Emma shook her head from behind the handkerchief. Red sighed and left the door to Henry’s bedroom open just a crack.

She and the doctor spoke in whispers. Emma strained to hear. She needed to hear.

“——anything you can do?” Red asked, desperation creeping into her tone.

The doctor smiled sadly. “He is sick with something medicine cannot treat,” he admitted. “I…well.”

“What?”

He shook his head. “I do not want to give you false hope.”

“Give it,” Red whispered fiercely. “I don’t care. I’m not going to watch him die knowing there was something else we could have done.”

The doctor shrugged. “I would not advise it, miss, but…well. Magic would be the only thing that might save him now.”

“…Magic?” Red croaked. “Like…like the Dark One?”

The doctor chuckled. “Not him. There are other, lesser sorcerers. Ones that will not put the next three generations of your family in debt.”

“Where do we find one?” Red asked.

“I couldn’t say, miss. Rarely do they stay in one place very long.”

“How long does Henry have?”

“I couldn’t guarantee it, but more than six months, at least. Less than a year.”

Emma buried her face in the kerchief.

“I didn’t want to say in front of the boy, miss, but there are other things I could give him, for the pain.”

“Anything.”

“It will cost you.”

“Emma?”

Emma peeked her tear-stained face out from behind the kerchief and nodded.

“You heard him?”

She nodded again.

While the doctor and Red haggled over a fair price for the additional treatments, Emma climbed to her feet and cracked open Henry’s door. She rested her cheek on the door-frame and watched him for a while; he’d fallen asleep on her side of the bed with the toy boat under his arm.

“Too much excitement,” Red said over her shoulder. She studied Henry fondly.

“What are we going to do?” Emma croaked.

Red squeezed her hand and closed the door so Henry could sleep. “We’re going to find a sorcerer.”

“How?”

Red put a finger to her lips and drew Emma downstairs, setting her up at the bar with a cup of cocoa dashed with a drop of whiskey. Emma closed her eyes and cupped it in her hands, and just held the warmth against her skin for a moment.

Once she heard Red sit down across from her, she opened her eyes and took a long draught. Sighing, she said, “Ok.”

There was a hardened resolve in Red’s eyes as she set her hands down on the surface of the bar and said. “I’m going to go to the Enchanted Forest.”

Emma cried out and jumped to her feet. “What? Why? You can’t!”

Red rolled her eyes and shushed her. “Sit back down.”

“Red, why would you——”

“Are you going to keep screaming or hear me out?”

“I…” Emma’s next protest died on her lips and she sulked back to her seat under Red’s stern expression.

“Ready?”

“I guess.”

Red glared at her but continued. “I’ll cross the border in disguise and keep a low profile until I reach the capitol. There’s guaranteed to be a sorcerer or two operating there.”

“Who’ll keep the tavern?”

Red snorted. “You, obviously.”

“I’m just a waitress.”

“And you help Granny with the accounts every Sunday.” Red laughed. “We’ll hire another waitress for the time being, part time, and you and Granny can take over the kitchen. You won’t be as good as me, obviously—” Red winked. “But you’ll do.”

Emma fidgeted with her hands, studying the red skin near her nails where she had bitten herself raw. Red sighed and cupped her hands together. “Emma, honey. I know what you’re thinking. But you need to stay here with Henry.”

“But I won’t get killed——”

“Stop that right now.” Red shook her head furiously. “Don’t even think about it. We don’t know how much time Henry has left. You need to spend every last minute with him, you hear me? I know you keep your cards close to your chest. You’ve put him at arm’s distance for so long because you don’t think you deserve him. But honey, I see the way you watch him when he’s in Granny’s lap for story-time, and you were the one who tossed that stupid ball back and forth with him for hours when all he wanted was to go outside and play like a normal little boy. Don’t think I didn’t notice you showing up to the dinner shift twenty minutes late because of that, by the way.”

Emma blushed and rubbed the back of her neck.

“He’s your kid and you love him,” Red insisted softly, rubbing Emma’s hands between hers. “Don’t worry about me. I can do this.”

Emma peeked up and met her eyes. “Red…you’ve already done so much for us. You don’t have to do this too.”

Red snorted. “You still don’t get it. This isn’t some sort of…favor, or obligation. You’re family, you idiot. You’re like my sister, and that makes Henry my nephew.”

Tears pricked Emma’s eyes and she let out a little frustrated sob, trying to plug them up with her fingers. She was so tired of crying all the damn time. Red circled the bar and gathered her up and held her. Emma pressed her face in her neck and cried silently, wetting Red’s shoulder but not making a sound. Red drew circles on Emma’s back with her hand——just the finger tips, with the utmost gentleness. Emma wondered she’d learned how to hold Henry that way because Red and Granny had done it to her first.

Henry was too delirious to be aware of Red’s going, but Emma walked her all the way to the edge of town, where Red stopped her and insisted it would be less conspicuous if she went on to the border by herself. There was a rich ruby-colored cloak which she favored, but she’d exchanged it for a more discreet black. Emma held the ruby cloak in a bundle against her chest and Red kissed both her cheeks with a reassuring smile.

“Are you sure?” Emma said.

“Don’t start this again.”

“I could go instead.”

“You need to be with your son.” Emma squeezed her hands and the tears in her eyes mirrored the dampness Emma felt in her own.

“Hey.” Red pressed their foreheads together and Emma somehow felt worse, that her friend be obligated to act as a comfort to Emma in this moment, instead of the other way around.

“Why are you doing this?” Emma pressed.

Red smiled. In her eyes was acceptance. Serenity. “You didn’t have a family before, so I don’t blame you. This is what families do for each other. Without needing or wanting anything in return.

Tears spilled from Emma’s eyes. “But why?

Red gripped the sides of her face fiercely. “Because of love, dumbie.”

———

When Emma returned to the tavern, Henry asked for Red, because every day she visited like clockwork to bring him his breakfast. He wasn’t coherent enough to be suspicious when Emma carried his tray of porridge up instead, but he did say “Red” sleepily, making Emma wonder if he even recognized her. He was usually at least able to recognize the person speaking to him. But he was so hot and so exhausted, his little body rung out from fighting for so long, and fear shot through Emma as she wondered if the last time her son recognized who she was had already happened and she hadn’t known, hadn’t been able to appreciate it.

That night, Henry stopped breathing. It barely lasted a moment, but his face bruised purple. Emma screamed Red’s name but of course there was no Red, and for a crazed, insane moment she hated Red for abandoning them.

Then she remembered something they’d practiced and her body sprang into motion; she pressed her fists to his chest and breathed into his mouth. It didn’t work at first and she realized she had to pinch his nose closed. Finally, whatever had been stuck became unstuck.

Henry, who’d been awake for all of it, starting crying as soon as he was able to, and clung to Emma as if that would somehow keep him alive.

Emma didn’t know that feeling; she couldn’t remember a time when, no matter the offense, sick or sad or broken, as long as her mother’s arms were around her, she was safe. She stared at Henry’s tired face, nestled in the sling of her forearm, and knew that he believed, without a doubt, that she would take care of everything.

It was misplaced trust. Emma hadn’t been able to so much as look at him on the day he was born. If Red and Granny hadn’t been there, she was scared to think what could’ve happened. She ignored his existence for a month, then another and another. She didn’t care that he would grow attached to Granny and Red instead, if she didn’t at least try to bond with him. The world was passing through a foggy glass window, something she couldn’t touch and could barely see.

She’d woken up one morning, around Henry’s sixth month, and she’d felt hungry, which was a rarity in those days, and so she’d walked down to the kitchen and no one was there. It was almost time to open, and Red didn’t like to sleep late, so she pattered back to the third floor and peeked in all the bedrooms, but they were empty. She checked the yard and the outhouse and it was the same.

She hovered in the middle of the yard and stared at the abandoned road. A part of her, muted but conscious, decided now was the time to be worried.

The other part of her wondered if she was high or drunk, passed out in an alley somewhere, and she had dreamed Red and Granny and yes, Henry too, into existence. She’d been dreaming all along. Nothing was real. She was a shadow self, a dream person.

To this day, she didn’t know how long she stood in the dirt, but at some point she heard a gasp and her world and the real world collided back together.

A hand gripped her forearm; she squawked and jumped away.

Red’s voice jerked her back to a world that did, after all, exist.

“Hey, hey, it’s ok.” Arms around her. Red’s smell filled her nose, frying oil and lavender bath soap and a musky forest scent beneath it all.

“You have to open the tavern,” she said.

Red pulled away. “Emma,” she said. “What day is it?”

“Um. Tuesday, I think.”

“It’s Sunday, sweetie.”

Emma frowned. “But I thought——”

“Well, look who it is Henry!” Granny walked up behind Red with the baby in her arms. She bounced him. “Look. It’s your mama.”

Henry stared at her. She stared back. He blew a spit bubble.

“I thought it was Tuesday,” Emma said.

Granny steered the baby into her arms and Emma caught him without thinking. He didn’t seem perturbed by the switch and sucked his fist, babbling in baby sounds, which were high and sweet and gurgly, and Emma could see how she could get attached, if she could feel anything at all.

“We always go on a walk Sunday morning,” Red said.

Granny patted Emma’s cheek. “Red and I have to prep for the lunch crowd,” she said, and followed her granddaughter inside.

Emma didn’t know what to do so she made a couple loops around the yard. Henry was both lighter and heavier than she’d expected. Light because, well, he was still a baby. Heavier because he was so solid, and real, and until then he’d just been an idea in her head. Light like a feather that she could just keep blowing away whenever it came back.

She put Henry down on the ground and sat next to him. He could sit up on his own; she hadn’t expected yet. He could smile now too, and not just from gas.

He seemed confused on the ground at first, then with awkward, clumsy motions, pushed dirt between his fingers. He froze. He looked at Emma, who wasn’t stopped him. Then he did it again and squealed.

By the time Red poked her head out the door to call them in for lunch, Henry was sitting in Emma’s lap while she, much to his delight, arranged a leaf at the top of the little tower she had built out of dirt and pebbles. He followed every movement her fingers made, even though he kept rubbing his eyes and letting his head loll back against Emma’s chest.

“It’s nap time for someone, I think,” Red said.

“For two someones,” Emma said, because she hadn’t spent this long out of bed in months and already felt her body fatiguing. Red cooed and picked up Henry and Emma followed them into the tavern and up the stairs.

Outside Emma’s room, Red paused. “Maybe you can take a nap together?”

Emma fidgeted her with her hands and watched Henry watch her with his sleepy eyes. “Maybe…not yet?”

Red smiled and patted her arm. “OK. Not quite yet.”

((()))

  
Henry gave muffled whimpers into Emma’s arm, and she arranged him so that his chin was propped on her shoulder. He didn’t like this and wiggled, but she stroked his back until he settled. “You can breathe better this way, kiddo,” she whispered, making minute rocking gestures back and forth, because sometimes the rhythm helped him sleep. But that sort of thing didn’t work anymore. His discomfort was too great. Every breath was a struggle. Emma didn’t understand what was happening inside him. The doctors didn’t either. It wasn’t ordinary influenza. Even if it had been, without magic the best they could’ve done was quarantine him.

He snuffled against her chest. She thought of Red alone on the road to the capitol. Even if Red risked taking her wolf form, it was at least a two-week journey through the vast ranges of pine forests and hills, all full of soldiers and bandits who would not take kindly to a lone wolf in their territory, never mind if they discovered she was a shape shifter.

She loved Red. She did. Her friend was a hero for even attempting to make the journey. But Emma couldn’t rely on her odds of successfully reaching the capitol and convincing a city-slick wizard or witch to take a many-week voyage through wilderness for the sake of a tiny boy far away.

That night, she didn’t sleep, but instead caught Henry every time his breathing became more ragged than usual, rocking him and murmuring nonsense and rubbing his chest. She wished she could breathe for him. She’d never had any good use for her life; surely he deserved it more.

It was worse without Red there to soothe her panicked conjectures every time Henry whimpered or whined or worst of all, when he went silent.

Through the window in Henry’s room, there was a view of the Dark One’s Keep. It stuttered in jagged lines into the sky, a silhouette that absorbed the darkness around it. She thought of the Witch in the eastern tower. She wondered if she was still harvesting hearts.

Emma had known better than to whisper a word of the Witch’s secret to anyone, even Red. She’d locked it in the deepest corner of her mind, but took it out sometimes and turned it around in her head, trying to think of the reason anyone would need that many hearts. She knew a little about magic, as most village peasants did; hearts held power. Power that could be channeled into the magic of spells and incantations and potions. It was dark magic, stained by a history of blood and revenge and wicked intentions. Only the strongest of witches could harness the power at all without killing themselves. And that had clearly not been the Witch’s first time. Did she pay their bounty to the sheriff, or let them discreetly go missing. How long had she been spiriting away unsuspecting townsfolk under the pretense that they were criminals? Not that they weren’t——Mork and Grimm were scum of the lowest order and Emma couldn’t regret that she’d helped take them off the street. She just couldn’t condone what had happened after.

Emma rocked Henry and stared at the tower. She could see a distant light in one of the windows. She looked down at Henry and tried to decide the price she would pay to save him. How far she was willing to go, how much of her morality she was willing to sacrifice. Would she blacken her heart if it kept him alive?

She had always considered her life forfeit——she probably should have starved to death as an orphan in some alley. Most kids she knew had, or else gotten mixed up in the wrong crowd and inevitably been stabbed in the back or knifed in their beds or found drowned and bloated on the riverbed. She was living on borrowed time.

But Henry was alive. She’d almost killed his seed in the womb. In the whorehouses the mistresses always had something on hand. They maybe would’ve twittered and scolded and laughed at her but then forgotten in a day, when the next weeping girl came to ask for their help.

Before she could try, Bael had found out she was pregnant. He was drunk, ecstatically so, and held her up to the whole bar and cheered; the next few rounds were on someone else and Bael got drunker and drunker. By the time they stumbled into the street Emma was feeling marginally better. She wasn’t drunk at all——Bael had insisted that it was bad for the baby——but her lover’s acceptance bolstered her spirit and she’d begun to envision a future with the three of them together. Bael would stop drinking when the baby came, he’d promised her so, and though she wasn’t so naive as to completely believe that, a surge of hope filled up her chest and lungs.

When they got home he beat her. She’d never seen his mood sour so fast. Fucking whore. Dirty filthy whore. She didn’t know the rest because he’d struck the side of her head so many times that after a certain point, all she remembered was the spin-spin-spinning and then nothing.

She gotten out of the house in the morning; she’d been assigned a new guy by the sheriff, some petty thief whose family was relatively wealthy and wanted him back. She got in a tussle with the guy, which she lost because her head was still reeling from Bael’s beating. At that point she’d been struck so many times, she began to hope that maybe between the two of them, the destruction of the seed had been handled for her. Fate’s one kindness. But no. She subsisted on scraps off the street and avoided Bael when she could. And even though she was starving, the seed kept on growing. Freezing in winter, frostbitten and delirious——still the nugget of life inside her survived.

He’d stuck around long enough for her to find him a family. No matter what happened to her, he would always be able to come home to Red and Granny. He would be loved. What did her own soul matter, next to that?

Kissing the top of Henry’s head, she carefully maneuvered them out of bed. Henry whined. “Shh,” Emma said, pressing her nose in his hair. Despite the sick, he still smelled like him.

Hoisting him against her shoulder more comfortably, she slipped her feet into a sturdy pair of boots Red had left behind. She ignored the ache that was already beginning to develop in her biceps; Henry wasn’t so easy to carry anymore. But she had a long walk, and she was bringing him with her so that if she had a moment of doubt, she could look down and see him and remember what she was doing this for. Besides, she was afraid to leave him alone. She was afraid of not being able to see him.

Henry was hot, but she wrapped him in one of Granny’s thick cloaks anyway. The wind swirled up leaves in her path. She’d forgotten a cloak for herself, but Henry’s body heat was making her skin sticky despite the chill. She smelled deep winter on the air. All the more important then, that he was well before snow and ice and freezing temperatures rendered his body incapable of fighting once and for all.

A deep maroon color had settled on the horizon, signaling that sunrise was nearly upon them. She quickened her step so that they were on the road to the Keep before the first stirrings of the village began.

The blackwood doors were as she remembered them. She grasped the thick brass knocker and rapped it three times.

A servant who looked vaguely family opened a flap in the door and peered down at them. “What business do you have at the Dark One’s Keep?” they asked. He didn’t not seem perturbed that a woman and child had appeared on the doorstep in the wee hours of the morning.

Emma pressed her hand to the back of Henry’s head. He was sleeping, at last, cheek pillowed on her shoulder. “My name is Emma and this is Henry. I’m here to see the Witch.”

((()))

When she was a girl, Regina had slept like the dead. She rode hard with her father and the rest of the hunt. Her studies were administered by a governess hand-picked by Cora, and lessons were long and arduous. She helped clean the stables in the evenings before supper. So when she finally crawled up to bed, after playing the piano in the parlor for her mother, she was exhausted. Sleep came easy. And when she slept it was deep, contented sleep. It was sleep that had been earned.

Under the Dark One’s tutelage, she’d had her lessons and studies and hours of practical application. Her schedule shifted. She woke up later but stayed awake long hours into the evenings. The Dark One usually flitted off somewhere for the night, to torture and trick or play his games, and most of the time he didn’t return until the middle of the day. Official lessons ran from mid-afternoon to evening. The rest of the time, Regina was left to her own devices.

The scheduled lessons dropped off as Regina grew more intuitive and independent. The Dark One no longer needed to peer over her shoulder to make sure she didn’t kill herself or explode something. He started to leave her more or less to her own devices. With no one dictating the hours of her schedule, she became a lackadaisical sleeper. She took scattered naps in the afternoon. She stayed awake right through midnight and on to dawn, working in her laboratory, and then slept until lunchtime.

When the knock came on her laboratory door, she was practicing an endurance trick——holding stationary magic in her hands for as long as she could, without letting it spiral out of control. Magic was power, the Dark One liked to say. But magic was also control, and that’s why Regina loved it.

The rap on her door broke her concentration and she let the magic fizzle out in her palms. “What?”

The door cracked open and a powder-faced servant dressed in silver peered inside. “Pardon me, Mistress. A Miss Emma Swan requests an audience, Mistress? I told her that, due to the late hour, you might not——”

“No,” Regina said. She slipped her stockinged feet into heeled boots and stood.

“Mistress?”

“Send her in.”

Regina recalled the horrified expression on Emma’s face the last time they’d seen each other. She’d made a bit of a mess of things, exposing herself to a village girl, but she was fairly certain that Emma was content to have her silence bought. She wondered if that’s what this was; Emma had decided her secret was worth more. It was an inconvenience and a nuisance, but mostly a minor one, in the grand scheme of things. The Dark One gave her unlimited access to his vault, so she could pay for whatever she needed. He’d lived through the eras of hundreds of different currencies. What was money to him? He had other ways of getting what he wanted.

When Emma appeared, another surprise: she held a child in her arms.

They stared at each other a long time. Emma’s eyes were clear and glassy. Regina held a small purse in her hands; she thought she had known what was going to happen. But Emma stood in the doorway with the boy cradled on her shoulder, and Regina wondered. “Why on earth would you bring a child here?”

Emma’s hand on his head clenched. “You can’t have his heart.”

Regina snorted. “I don’t want his heart, Miss Swan.” She was pragmatic. Not cruel. “What I mean is, people don’t generally make a habit of trusting me around children.”

She heard the boy wheezing from across the room. He started to slip from Emma’s arms, but she hoisted him higher on her shoulder with a grunt. The jostle woke him, and he looked around in a daze. Regina was startled by his green eyes and dark hair; he looked like Emma, but also nothing like her at all. Sweat beaded on his forehead and slicked up and down his neck. Emma traced her fingers up and down his back without seeming to realize it. She never took her eyes off Regina.

“He’s sick,” Regina realized.

Emma closed her eyes and nodded. She rested her cheek on the top of the boy’s head. Her knees shook; her spine sagged. But when Regina circled the desk, she jolted to alertness and took a step back.

“I’m not going to hurt him, Miss Swan,” Regina said.

“You can’t have his heart.”

“His heart does not belong to me, I think,” Regina said. She raised her hand slowly, so that Emma could follow her movements. “May I?”

“What are you going to do?”

“I want to understand what’s making him sick.”

“None of the doctors know.”

A smirk played on Regina’s mouth. “I am not a doctor.”

Emma hesitated.

“Believe it or not,” Regina said. “Magic would be of no interest to me if I couldn’t do a little good with it every now and again.”

Emma stiffened. “Tell that to the men whose hearts you stole.”

“This isn’t about hearts, Miss Swan. You came here for a reason.”

“He’s dying,” Emma whispered.

“That, I can sense from here.”

“Can you use magic to help him?”

“Perhaps.”

“You’re no good to me at all, if you can’t.”

Regina smiled sadly. “I’d have to examine the boy first, dear.”

“Can’t you do it from over there?”

Regina shook her head. “Not as thoroughly.”

“Can you make him better?”

Regina fixed her with a hard stare. “You,” she said at last. “Are exhausted. Is the boy yours?”

Just as she’d hoped, this new line of questioning threw Emma off her track.

“Yes,” she said. Then in a daze, she added, “I walked all the way here.”

“From the village?”

“Yes. From the village.”

The girl swayed; she was so tired she was practically descending into delirium. If Regina hadn’t seen for herself the hardened bounty hunter who’d caught and dragged two large men all the way to the Dark One’s dungeon, she would never have been able to reconcile the two versions of this woman. Her curiosity, if nothing else, was piqued.

“I’m going to call a servant,” Regina said, retreating to her desk. “He’ll arrange a room for you and the boy.”

That jerked Emma awake. “What? No, I can’t stay here. I have to—I came here to—”

“You’re not in a state to do anything, Miss Swan.” Regina rang the bell on her desk. “We can discuss the matter further once you’re coherent enough to make informed decisions.”

Emma frowned. She looked like she was trying to decide if Regina had just insulted her, and Regina found her scrunched, dimpled face dreadfully amusing.

A woman in a pale gray servant’s smock appeared at the door and curtsied. “Mistress,” she said to the floor, which made Regina realize that, besides the Dark One, Emma was the only person who’d looked straight at her eyes in nearly five years. Was that the last time her mother had visited? She couldn’t remember. The days all slid together.

“Miss Swan and her son require the making up of a room, Maria,” Regina said. “Let’s say the third floor, east wing. Spare no comfort. And bring this salve for the child’s chest, won’t you?”

She handed a small glass jar to the servant, who nodded and curtsied. “Right away, Mistress.”

“The salve should soothe his breathing for a few hours,” Regina explained to Emma, who was studying the jar suspiciously. “Miss Swan——Emma.” The girl looked up, startled. “If I wanted the boy’s heart, or anything else from him, or you, for that matter, I would have taken it already. Now, I will not do this task for nothing, but we can discuss terms in the morning. Consider the salve a goodwill gesture until we can draw up a contract. Understand?”

Emma nodded, but Regina wondered if she actually did. Never mind. It was no use trying to have a conversation with the tired, dazed, desperate version of this girl.

But before Maria could collect the mother and child and send them on their way, Emma shook her head and managed to meet Regina’s eyes. Again, Regina was struck by the directness of her gaze. Her eyes were bright blue——starry blue, like the sky right after a sunrise.

“I’ll bring you hearts,” Emma blurted.

An electric jolt shivered down Regina’s spine. “Excuse me?”

“If you help him. I’ll bring you as many hearts as you want.”

Regina felt her breath stop. But the clarity of Emma’s expression told her everything she needed to know. She exhaled. “Very well, Miss Swan. We’ll discuss it further in the morning. Good night.”

Shaken, she went back to her desk and sat down after the trio left. The door closed with a solid thud behind them.

But she grew restless almost immediately and went to the window, where her small garden was wilting since she’d been unable to find anyone else as discreet——or crazy, or desperate—as Emma to help her harvest hearts. She brushed her finger down the stem of the plant in the green ceramic pot. She dragged her finger up the stem and thumbed the bud; if she looked closely, the tiniest veins of the leaf were red, not green or yellow.

When they bloomed, they would thrive. They would scatter their seeds all across the realm. Their roots would burrow deep into the ground, enriching the soil and feeding the fields of grains and fruits and vegetables with the energy of life itself. And no one, not even her mother, could stop it then. It would be too deep-rooted by the time Cora figured out why her drought had stopped working, why it didn’t matter if it never rained again; the life force of the realm would be revived by the strongest of magics. Regina was Cora’s equal; she suspected, perhaps, she had even surpassed her mother in talent and skill, and that’s why they continued to keep her locked up in a tower under the ruse that she could not be distracted from her studies.

But her studies were finished. She had learned everything the Dark One could have taught her, and now she was adapting it for her own purposes, playing with magic, converting life to life. The scope of the spell was as great as anything Cora or the Dark One had ever cast. And it would work. Regina knew that already. She was too good, the magic too great, for there to be even a margin of error.

The only uncontrollable variable, in all of this, was upstairs in a guest room that hadn’t been used in years, sleeping in the queen bed with her dying son.

((()))

  
  


Regina stood at the window of her bed chambers in a satin nightgown. The sun crowned the sky in a brilliant golden blaze, warming her bronze arms. The castle, built of quartz stone, was hardly insulated and nearly always cold. Regina had chosen this room, out of all the dozens, for its wide glass window that channeled that warmth of the sun right through to her bed as she woke.

Garmir was further north than the valley where she had spent her youth. The days were slightly shorter. Not that it much mattered; the closest to the outside world that she ever came was the rooftop garden that the Dark One had never touched but given her permission to cultivate.

Her first attempt at the growth of a living thing had been disastrous, but she insisted on succeeding without magic. There had to be one thing, just one, in her life that magic didn’t touch. Even now, she held to that missive. She grew herbs and used them in her various salves and elixirs. She suspected she might have been a healer in another life, if her mother hadn’t insisted on honing her as a weapon. But she couldn’t even bring herself to want that now, a simple life as the local village witch. She was too powerful now. There was too much to do. The scope of her vision had to be far wider than it ever had as a child.

A servant knocked on the door.

“Enter.”

“They’re awake, Mistress.”

“Take them to the kitchen. Feed them whatever they desire, then see them to my study.”

“Yes, Mistress.”

The boy had some disease of the lung. From the sound of his coughs, she suspected fluid build-up, something that these useless country bumpkin doctors had no cure for.

Rural medicine was another problem she intended to solve as soon as she ended a twenty-year famine.

She dressed in day-clothes, then went to her study and waited. When Emma and the boy emerged, they were dressed in plain, clean cotton clothes. Emma set the boy down and he was able to stand on his own, though he leaned on his mother and sucked on the side of his fist.

“Whatever you gave him last night,” Emma said, staring in wonder down at her son. “It worked.”

“Of course it worked. But I’m afraid the salve will merely control his symptoms for a time. He is not cured. For that, I need to examine him myself, Miss Swan.”

Emma squeezed the boy’s hand. He rested his weight on her leg, his breathing shallow. Already fatigued from that short period of supporting his own weight.

But there was something else…some peculiar expression on his face that Regina didn’t understand but drew her attention right away.

He wasn’t afraid of her. Not in the least. He looked almost…fascinated.

Her study was a menagerie of thick, leather-bound books, jars of sparkling magic, wooden chests that glowed from the inside, candlewicks that bobbed up and down, floating in the air by themselves. A ceiling that was painted with twinkling stars that revolved in time with the heavens.

Henry tipped slowly in a circle like he needed to make sure he hadn’t missed a single, wondrous thing. Then he tugged his mother’s sleeve and whispered something in her ear that made Emma wince.

“You’re magic,” he said to Regina.

Regina opened her mouth, because, yes, of course, what else would I be? But she closed it again. At a loss. She had never heard anyone say it like that before. Magic. Like it was enchanting. Like it held the hope of every child’s most precious dream. Like it was the stars themselves, and like Regina had never been sold for a crown or locked in a tower or taken for an evil witch.

She nodded. “I…yes.”

He grinned so bright it blinded her.

“Yes,” Emma said firmly. “She’s magic and she’s going to help you.”

It was like speaking a promise into existence. But Regina also heard another, underlying message; if she did anything to break Henry’s illusion that magic——that Regina herself——was good and benevolent, there would be hell to pay. Regina suspected that, to Emma Swan, it may just be a worse offense than harvesting human organs.

Since Regina’s childhood, magic had been a curse. A source of manipulation and trickery. Accompanied by lies and debts that were impossible to pay, and the callousness of her mother’s laugh when she said, Of course you will be queen.

Emma should not have worried. Regina had no intention of shattering a sick little boy’s fantasies. She’d maybe like to live in those fantasies herself, for a while.

Holding her hands up so Emma would not be afraid, Regina stepped out from behind her desk and crouched a short distance from Henry.

“Would you like to see?” she asked.

“Really?”

Regina glanced at Emma for permission. Emma placed a hand on Henry’s shoulder.

“Please, Mama?”

“I…” Emma rubbed her face. “Fine.”

Henry squealed. Regina chuckled, and then little shots of purple light, like fireworks, sparked from her hands. Unlike fireworks, they moved like birds or fish, twisting and twirling in the cup she had created with her palms.

“Oh.” Henry’s eyes widened as he crouched with her. He reached out with his fingers and she quickly withdrew.

“Don’t touch, darling,” she said, extinguishing the fluttering wisps of light.

“Again,” Henry said.

“No touching. Do you promise?”

“Yes, uh uh. Mama look.”

“I see, kiddo.” Emma looked torn; fascinated, Regina could tell, and loathe to deny Henry anything he wanted.

She grinned and snapped the spark back to life, where it played in lazy circles up and over and around her hand, weaving between her fingers.

While Henry’s attention was caught by the light display, she closed her eyes and sent a cord of magic under his skin and into his veins. She sent the cord up to his chest, where it wrapped around his lungs and wiggled up to his heart. It zipped down to the tips of his fingers and toes.

“What are you doing?” Emma demanded.

Of course she’d noticed something had changed. Regina needed to stop underestimating her powers of observation. She was a good bounty hunter for a reason.

She blinked open her eyes and withdraw the cord of magic. “I’m done,” she said.

Emma’s frowned. “What did you do?”

“I told you I needed to examine the boy.”

Henry had barely noticed, distracted by the gentle purple energy that had swirled up and around Regina’s wrists.

“How?” Emma asked.

“Really, Miss Swan, sometimes you’re brilliant and others...” She wiggled her fingers and sparks of magic flew.

“OK,” Emma said. “That’s enough.” She drew Henry close to her body.

Regina let the magic dissipate like fairy dust. She stood and brushed her hands on her skirts. “It’s possible that I may be able to draw up an elixir,” she said. “But you’re not going to like this next part.”

“There aren’t any parts about this that I like,” Emma retorted.

“Be that as it may.” Regina circled back around to the other side of her desk. “What do you know about hearts, Miss Swan?”

Emma’s eyes narrowed. “Enough.”

“Do you know that the life force of a single heart has the potential for channeling some of the most powerful magic in the world?” Emma didn’t respond. “Each person’s energy signal is their own. Unique to them. Let me explain: in order to create an elixir strong enough to banish the disease forever, I will need to become familiar with his energy signature. I may even need to add a small sample to the elixir so his body doesn’t reject it.”

“His heart?”

“Will stay in his body, I assure you. The next part you will like even less.”

“Go on.”

“The boy needs to stay here with me. I need to have access. And I…I cannot leave this keep.”

Emma’s eyes darted to the side and back to hers. “What?”

“Don’t look so shocked, Miss Swan. Conditions come with being the Dark One’s pupil.”

“You want Henry to live here?”

“With your supervision, of course. I hardly have time to worry about the day-to-day minutia of raising a child. You will resume your work for me; everything will be the same as it was before, except this will be your home for the time being.”

“Why are you doing this? Is this…is this some sort of trick?”

“I have no interest in tricks, Miss Swan, and I’d thank you not to accuse me of it again.”

“Excuse me for not trusting the Dark One’s personal pet, but——”

“Watch yourself, Miss Swan.”

“Why should I trust you?”

“Because I’ve never lied to you.”

Emma looked startled.

Regina smirked. “Everything I’ve ever said to you has been the perfect truth.”

“You deceived me. You omitted things.”

Regina shrugged. “You never asked. I’m not obligated to tell you everything, Miss Swan. You are my employee, not the other way around.”

“I’m not one of your, your maidservants,” Emma said.

“Nevertheless, you are on my payroll.”

“I—”

“Mama?”

Emma shut her mouth immediately.

Regina cleared her throat and flattened a crinkle in her skirt. “That will be all for today, I think, Miss Swan.”

Emma’s face softened as she looked at her son. “Are you sleepy?”

“I want to see more magic,” he mumbled into her pant-leg.

“How ‘bout a nap first?”

He rested his chin on her thigh and stared up at her. “Magic then napping.”

Emma’s expression shifted from amusement to fondness. “Come here, smart man.” She swooped him into her arms, making him shriek. Once he was settled on her shoulder, she caught Regina’s eyes and stiffened, flushing as she tucked Henry against her side.


	7. Chapter Seven

Red crouched in her cloak and ate a small meal of bread soaked in chicken broth from a vendor in the border town. At the end of the wide central street was a gate, and protruding from both sides of this was the wall that marked the border between Garmir and the Enchanted Forest. The journey had taken two days. She hadn’t dared used her wolf form, even though that would have cut the time in half.

In her pocket were the papers Emma had forged for her, designating her an Enchanted Forest citizen by birth; she had been born in Garmir and was going to visit her father’s family in the capitol. They owned a modest bakery. There were too many bakeries in a city like that for anyone to confirm if Matting & Son’s was a legitimate place of business. The guards might not even ask. Unlike some shape-shifters, who retained certain animal characteristics even in their human form, she appeared to be an average human girl. No more, no less. And in a pinch she could tug down her cloak and flash her cleavage, if she needed to create a distraction.

She funneled the rest of the broth into her mouth, swallowed and licked her lips, hoping it didn’t too closely resemble a wolf licking their chops. Her body ached; she hadn’t shifted in over two days, and her body was protesting. There wouldn’t be any chance to do so once she crossed the border either; even if it seemed like she was alone, the forest had eyes. Especially this close to Garmir. Small coalitions of Enchanted Forest guards populated the woods like ants, keeping watch from outposts disguised among trees and undergrowth.

Ideally, Red would be able to scent something like that long before she stumbled upon it, but it just wouldn’t do to be careless. Henry was on her mind as she stood and brushed dirt from her knees. Her little Henry. Fondness squeezed her heart. What she’d told Emma was true; Henry had seemed to make their family complete. The common tie that bound them all for good. Before Henry, they’d each been a bit adrift, Red reeling from the loss of her parents, Granny struggling to work the tavern by herself. Emma, of course, lost and abandoned worse than either of them.

For the first six months of Henry’s life, she had taken on the role of surrogate mother. Even after that, Emma didn’t transform into a doting and attentive parent overnight. So she and Henry had a special bond. She would always be the one who held him, skin to skin, in his first few days as a newborn, shushing him and feeding him and changing him; having to keep something so weak and helpless alive had changed Red fundamentally. Oh, she didn’t want children of her own. She was content in her auntie role. But her total devotion to Henry was unlike anything she’d ever experienced before. As soon as the doctor said that there was still hope, she had known. She would go. If it meant the slightest chance that they could save Henry, that they would get another month, another year, another ten years.

She brushed away tears with a corner of Emma’s cloak. She missed the security of her own ruby cloak, a gift from Granny and her mother on her sixteenth birthday, but of course it would have been ostentatious and impractical. Basically a death sentence. Besides, Henry loved it. Emma had promised it would stay on his bed while Red was gone.

She stretched and returned her metal bowl and spoon to the food vendor. The square bustled with buyers and sellers from either side of the border, though the atmosphere was noticeably more tense than Red remembered from the days when Granny had brought her here as a little girl.

Hefting her knapsack over a shoulder, she made her way through the crowd to the gate, an iron contraption two stories tall and as thick as a broad man’s torso. She had never been through to the other side. Not even in the early days, before the disappearance of the Princess Rosalie had forced tensions between the two countries to a head. Only the fact that the Enchanted Forest was on the brink of starvation stopped them from forcing the shape-shifters into war.

Garmir could have won that war and the conflict between them would’ve been resolved, once and for all. Instead Garmir had offered their enemies aid——they weren’t exactly about to let children starve if they could help it. Despite all that, the humans still viewed shape-shifters as barbarians and monsters. Still they mistrusted any who set foot on their land.

Emma’s forged identification was convincing, but neither of them knew for sure if the papers looked legitimate enough to trick the Enchanted Forest’s border patrol.

She nodded to the guard on Garmir’s side of the border, then wondered if any friendly gesture towards shape-shifters would immediately make her suspect. Paranoid, she ducked her head and kept an even expression as the first iron gate was opened to reveal a wide open space, on the other side of which was a second door. Red waited in a short line of mostly men until it was her turn to step up and present her papers to the Enchanted Forest guard. He looked her up and down and then grunted, gesturing to someone out of her sight.

“Check her,” he said.

Red had counted on her allure to get her past the guards, most of whom were still mere boys, but her heart dropped to her stomach when she saw who approached the table. The woman had pale skin and long, silky black hair. She was as broad as any man and wore chain-mail that accentuated the subtle, rippling muscle beneath.

Red’s mouth went dry.

This was going to be harder than she’d thought.

She nodded to the woman, who studied her without expression. Then she jerked her head, indicating that Red should follow. A few men from the line snickered. They quieted when the woman stopped and fixed them with a long look.

“Don’t dawdle,” she said to Red, who felt like a schoolgirl being chastised for tardiness. She scurried after the soldier.

The woman ushered her into a small, vacant room; once they were in, she locked the door and drew the curtains. A single oil lamp sat on the table. The woman shifted it to full pressure and their shadows flew against the walls.

“Papers,” the woman said. Red unfolded them from her pocket and tried to fold out the crease, but the woman gestured impatiently. Red handed over the parchment.

“Name,” the woman said.

“Ruby Breers.”

“Town of origin,”

“Senta.”

“Purpose of visit.”

“Visiting family.”

“What family?”

“My father.”

The woman peered over the paper at her. “Who is your father?”

“A baker. In the capitol. Miss.”

“Address me as Sir, please.” The woman scanned the rest of the papers. Red’s heart pounded but she had too much experience schooling her expressions after all her years at tavern, evading lewd men’s advances, solicitors, town drunks, and the like. She gave nothing away and checked that her shoulders were relaxed. Business as usual.

“This is your first time in the Enchanted Forest,” the soldier noted.

“Yes. Sir.”

“Why?”

“Why..what, sir?”

“Presumably you have always had a father…why haven’t you made the crossing before?”

“Couldn’t afford it. My mother was a beggar after he left her.”

“Why was she in Garmir?”

“Died before I could ask her.”

“And you didn’t go to stay with your father then?”

“He had another family, by then. Sir.”

The soldier narrowed her eyes. “Very well. Arms up.”

“Excuse me?”

The soldier circled the table to stand before Red. “Arms. Up.”

Red couldn’t help it; she recalled that night, two months ago, when that man, Grimm, had come into the tavern. He’d leered and stared and called her lewd names. Nothing she hadn’t heard before from drunken fools, but he was different. There was a dangerous gleam in his eye and he scared her. He’d known it too, smirking and sidling close to her. If you put your arms up I can unlace you pretty lady

“Red…Red.”

The gentle voice called her back. She flashed her eyes open. “Who’s…”

Oh. She was Red. Biting her lip, she realized the woman was watching her in concern.

“Sit down,” the woman said, softening her tone. Red sat. The woman perched on the lip of the table.

“My name is Mulan,” she said. “When a woman passing through is pulled aside and checked, I take care of it. I requested to. The men are…” She frowned.

“Yes.” Red smiled nervously. “I know.”

“Yes. I imagine…” She shook her head. “Ruby. You are safe here. I just need to check for any hidden weapons or contraband. It’s protocol, that’s all. Can you let me do that?”

Red wanted to laugh or cry. Safe? Here was the last place in the world where she would ever be safe. But she had no smuggled goods to speak of, so she nodded and rose to her feet. This time she put her arms in position.

“Turn around,” Mulan said.

Red felt Mulan’s hands pat briskly up and down her sides. The touch was polite and businesslike. Her fingers were long and reached many places at once; she passed over her chest and the inside of her thighs quickly, flashing Red an apologetic glance. She was blushing, Red realized. She picked out the flush even in the dark of the room.

Mulan straightened. “Not so bad, right?”

Red bit her lip and smiled. “Not so bad.”

Mulan handed over her knapsack. “You’re clear,” she said. “I’ll tell the captain you can be on your way.”

((()))

Emma woke up to the sleepy smell of Henry. He was still young enough to have that baby scent about him. So innocent. She’d missed it in the beginning. She’d missed six months of baby smell. Nuzzling her nose in his thick swell of hair, she curled him as close to her body as she could.

Sun spilled into their bed. Emma had never slept so well in her life. The mattress was thick and downy. Their bodies sunk into it. Above them was a canopy of rich velvet green with animal designs stitched in gold on each corner. Henry had named them to her the night before. Stag and hunting dog and fox and rabbit, arranged in a dangerous, circular pursuit of each other.

“They’re playing tag,” Henry had whispered, and Emma kissed the top of his head. He’d nuzzled into her chest, the closest contact he had initiated in months, and asked her to sing one of Granny’s songs. But she couldn’t think of any, so she hummed nonsensically until he slipped off to sleep. She stayed awake long after, long enough for the moon to reach its peak in the sky and pool its light on their pillows.

A maid knocked on the door with breakfast, but she put a finger to her lips and the girl sheepishly ducked out. Emma touched her nose to Henry’s cheek and inhaled once. That was all she allowed herself before climbing out of bed and dressing in britches and shirt that were plain but comfortable and freshly pressed. A bath had been offered to her as well, but that would be more useful tonight, when she returned.

She stood over the bed where Henry was sleeping. His chest rose and fell easily and made none of the raspy noises that had become the background noise of their lives.

Another servant came to the door and said, “She’s expecting you.”

When Emma hesitated, the servant added, “Francis’ll be watchin’ over him ‘erself, Miss. None know more about babies ‘n her.”

“Francis?”

“The nurse Mistress appointed to watch the boy. She’s raised a dozen babies in ‘er lifetime.”

“Sick babies?”

The servant nodded. “Some.”

Emma scuffed her foot on the floor and didn’t take her eyes off Henry.

“Mistress’ll be waiting, Miss,” the girl said.

The corridors held none of the brightness of the bedchamber. The stone walls were narrow and windowless. The servant paused every few steps to light an oil lamp as they went. Emma fidgeted. The girl smiled apologetically.

They walked a route that Emma was beginning to recognize. Several times the path forked, but she didn’t need the servant to tell her which one led to the tower. She wandered ahead of the girl. The cobblestone corridor dipped unevenly under her feet.

The Dark One’s Keep was crude and archaic. Sometimes, in the market, a vendor passed through with acrylic portrayals of the royal palace in the Enchanted Forest. It was said to be built entirely of white marble and constructed at the crown of a waterfall that poured into the sea. Emma couldn’t say what was true, but the Dark One’s Keep had stood empty for a thousand years before he’d taken up residence, and the village was fraught with legends of the great kings, long-dead, that had lived there in pre-history. Some said that the Dark One’s unnatural magic was the only reason it didn’t crumble to the valley floor.

They came to the base of the Witch’s tower. The servant said, “She summoned only you,” bowed quickly, and retreated.

The black-wood door with the heavy lion-clawed knocker was becoming familiar to Emma. She rapped it twice before it swung open of its own accord.

The Witch was dressed in her full black regalia. Her beauty was harrowing. She unnerved Emma when she smiled and showed her straight rows of white teeth. No crooked nose or blackened fingernails. The dark magic she practiced hadn’t manifested on her physical form the way the legends said it should.

“Enter, Miss Swan.”

Emma lingered in the doorway.

“If my aim was to trap you, it’d already be done.” The Witch licked an ink-stain on her thumb before dipping her peacock pen back into the jar. “But that’s not what I want.”

Emma stepped over the threshold and the door slammed behind her. She flinched. “Do you have to do that?” she grumbled at the floor.

The Witch laughed. “Let me tell you a secret. Magic is most attractive to the laziest among us.” Without taking her eyes off Emma, she flicked her wrist and set the hearth alight in a roar of flame.

Emma didn’t budge this time. “That explains why I have to do your dirty work for you.”

The Witch cocked her head and wagged her finger. “Ah-ah. Appearances deceive, Miss Swan. You of all people should know that.”

“What do you want?”

“For you to do the job I hired you to do.” The Witch materialized a piece of yellow parchment and showed the sketch of a face to Emma. “His name is Hamzl. He’s a shape-shifter. Is that going to be a problem?”

“I’ve dealt with worse.” She raised her eyebrows meaningfully at the Witch.

The Witch chuckled. “You’ll have to work on your insults, Miss Swan.”

“How do I know Henry will be safe?”

“You need not fear for Henry’s safety.”

“I’m not afraid,” Emma said. “I just don’t trust you.”

“I would never harm a child,” the Witch said. “Despite what you insist on believing, I am not the villain in this story. But there are villains, and they will not hesitate to torture a child to get what they want. They would not stop and think twice. If they believe you know anything that could lead them to me, they will not rest until you and everyone you love have suffered for it. There is no where in the world that is safer for Henry than this tower. Do you understand?”

Emma had seen the Witch furious, conniving, wry and disdainful, but this was something else. This was conviction. Conviction and fear.

“If I were you, Miss Swan, I would take that boy and run far, far away. But if you do, he will never be cured. He will be dead within the passing of six moons. I won’t ask again; do you understand?”

“I…I understand.”

“Good.”

((()))

Emma Swan understood nothing.

Her cloaked figure passed through the gates. Regina watched from her tower. Hamzl would occupy her for most of the day, so she rang a bell that could be heard throughout the castle via a system of pulleys, and in a moment the maidservant, Gretel, was at the door.

“Mistress?”

“Has the boy arisen yet?”

“I don’t know, Mistress.”

“Well, find out. And when he does, feed and bathe him, then bring him to me.”

Her wildflowers were closing in on themselves. Mere water wasn’t enough to sustain them anymore. In a way, she’d doomed them. They would live their natural lifespan craving magic. She had made them like her mother in order to fight her mother.

The boy shyly came to her some time later. She beckoned him, and he fidgeted with his hands as he crossed the room to her side. There, he stood on his tiptoes and became fascinated by a paper weight in the shape of a phoenix.

“Do you know what that is?” she asked.

“Uh-huh. Phanix.”

“Hmm.” Regina bit her lip so she wouldn’t correct him.

“Red drawed one for me,” he said.

“Who’s Red?”

“Auntie.” He drew his finger down the ridges of the phoenix’s tail.

The top of Henry’s head had a fluffy, feathery texture. It was very nearly black, but not quite, and it shaped his head like a cap. Regina tried to remember the last time a child had sat so close to her without being afraid.

“Is Mama gone?”

“She left this morning.”

“Oh.” He angled himself to lean against her chair. “She comin’ back?”

“What?”

“I live here now?”

“I…well, yes. For a little while. Until you feel well.”

“I do. I’m better. Go home now?”

“Oh. Henry.” Regina moved the inkwell farther away from the edge of the desk, then slid the phoenix gently from his grip, because his hands were a little too clumsy for her comfort.

He immediately whined and grabbed it, and before she knew how she’d got there, she was playing tug-of-war with a toddler. “That’s not a toy, Henry.”

“I want Mama.”

No three-year-old had the right to be so strong. “It’s not yours, Henry.” Regina tried to keep her voice even. “Please give it back.”

“Mama!” Henry shouted.

Regina let go of the phoenix. Henry backed away from her.

“She’s coming back,” Regina said. “She is.”

“When?”

“I don’t know for sure, Henry.”

“I want Mama.” The phoenix slipped out of his hands, just like she had expected would happen, and broke into two pieces when it hit the floor.

“Oh no.” Henry’s face crumbled. He peeked at Regina, who couldn’t hide her displeasure in time, and that was enough to bring on the waterworks. His eyes scrunched up and his lip jutted out and his chest quivered. The exaggeration of his features might have been funny in another circumstance, but Regina’s heart plummeted to her stomach as she panicked and wondered what in all the realms she thought she was doing.

“Henry, Henry,” she said, grabbing the phoenix off the floor. “It’s ok, Henry, it’s just a paperweight. I can fix it. Look.” Before she had a chance, he wailed, threw himself onto her lap and starting crying. Really crying. She grimaced, seeing already the mucus and tear stains on her clothes.

“Look, look, no, don’t cry.” She tried again to bring his attention to the ceramic shards in her hands, but he was too far gone. She’d never seen a child cry before, not like this. She touched his hands and his arms. She patted his head. She tried to lift his chin so he could see the lights she produced from her fingertips.

He didn’t register any of it. Didn’t even seem to remember she was there. Nothing could distract him.

She sort of admired his commitment.

There was nothing for it but to let him cry himself out on her lap, and when that was over he exploded in a fit of coughs, which she soothed by summoning a spare jar of ointment from the back of her cabinet and rubbing it on his chest.

By the time he could breathe again, he was so exhausted that he passed out against her chest, tucked into the dip of her skirts and drooling on her corset.

She was going to kill Emma Swan.

((()))

Henry awoke as the sun hit the horizon, disoriented and congested, curled up on the armchair in the corner. It was her father’s chair, which she had received, along with some of his books, when he’d died. Her father had developed some growth inside of him, a lump that expanded into his skill, pushing against his brain and slurring his speech. His mental faculties remained until the end. That was the worst of it. He couldn’t speak and could barely move, but he was still himself, inside.

He’d made sure, if nothing else, that the chair and box of texts reached Regina in her tower, even if she was not allowed to attend the funeral. She’d been too overcome with grief, and resigned to her mother’s influence, to put up much of a struggle on that front. She suspected it was her mother’s way of making her pay; she’d always liked her father more than Cora, and had made no secret of it. When the delivery arrived, Regina tucked it in the corner of her study, locked the door, and closed the curtains. Then she folded herself into the chair and allowed herself to cry.

She’d cried only the once. Then she pulled a sheet over the chair and didn’t look at it again. The books went onto her shelves, but not in any place of prominence. She’d long before put away her childish things, and they were nothing but an unwelcome intrusion. A distraction. A reminder of deep and buried feelings that she couldn’t afford to indulge, because there was too much work to do.

She could be patient. She would have revenge on her mother in her own time. She had nothing else to do, locked in this castle, surrounded by endless and complicated magic that could do anything she wanted it to do, if only she put her head down and taught herself how.

There was no other place to put Henry, besides the floor. She could have asked a servant to take him back to his room, but she didn’t want anyone seeing his body, prostrate and worn down by tears, and think she had had anything to do with it.

She feared she had had something to do with it. She’d failed so miserably at soothing his sadness. Her heart ached with the echo of his sobs. They’re been so real. They’d carried so much pain. How was it possible for a baby like that to feel so much pain?

He was still there when Emma dragged herself in around supper time, a bruise under her right eye and a clump of hair missing from the side of her skull. The skin of her palms had been rawed away somehow.

Regina inspected her. “You might clean yourself up before your son sees you looking like some bedraggled half-dead thing the cat left on the doorstep.”

Emma snorted. “Thank you, Emma, for wrestling a man who can turn into a panther so I can throw him in a dungeon and rip out his heart for my evil magical purposes.”

The servant in the background squeaked.

Regina froze. She blinked. She felt her tongue stick to the roof of her mouth. A purple fireball played at the tips of her fingers.

No one was allowed to talk to her like that. No one who wanted to live, anyway.

Well. No. Not no one.

Emma was. Emma could. Emma could say whatever she pleased without getting burned to a crisp where she stood because Regina needed Emma.

And Emma knew it.

Regina tried to quench the fire running through her hands before all that was left of Emma Swan was a pile of ashes.

She should have put a clause in the contract about having a little respect.

“Where’s my kid, anyway?” Emma asked.

“Oh, and about that. You might have warned the child you were leaving. He woke up convinced you’d abandoned him.”

Emma paled. Regina felt marginally vindicated. She made her wait a second longer before saying, “He’s in my study.”

“Your study?” Emma squawked and raced for the stairs. “I swear to the realms, Regina, if you hurt him——” The rest got lost when Emma reached the second floor.

She left Regina standing there baffled, feeling like something was different. Then she realized; Emma had called her by her name.

The servant still hovered, wide-eyed by the front door, seeming as shocked as Regina.

“What are you looking at?” she hissed.

The servant flushed and flinched, waiting, presumably, for a strike that didn’t come. He was lucky. Regina was too busy reeling. When he realized he was still in one piece, he muttered his sincerest apologies and fled down the nearest servant’s corridor.

By the time Regina got to her study, Henry had been reunited with his mother and the tantrum of that morning was forgotten. He was standing on the arm of her father’s chair and inspecting the books with pictures on them that were arranged on the shelf above it. Her father’s corner.

“Henry,” Emma said nervously. “Be careful.”

“You make a habit of teaching your children to disrespect other people’s furniture?”

Emma jumped.

Regina felt back on steady ground. “As you can see, Miss Swan, he has clearly been hung by his toes and stripped of his fingernails. My pet dragon had a delightful time eating his innards.”

“You got a dragon?” Henry exclaimed.

“No Henry, she doesn’t have a dragon,” Emma sighed.

“D’ya know any dragons?” he asked, oblivious to the tension between them as he balanced one foot on the chair, hand braced against the wall while he rifled through Regina’s limited picture book collection.

“Dragons don’t exist,” Emma said, at the same time that Regina replied, “I’ve met one or two.”

Emma glared at her. Regina grinned, showing her teeth.

“What are you looking for, darling?” she asked in a sing-song voice as she crossed the room to support Henry by the waist, and described the premise of each story that caught his attention. Emma cleared her throat. Regina ignored her and in doing so, sent a shot of adrenaline right down to her toes, though she couldn’t for the life of her have explained why.

Henry plucked a thin, illustrated volume off the end of the row. The corners of its leather binding were faded to yellow.

“Ah,” Regina said. She brushed her thumb down the soft leather. “This was one of my favorites when I was a little girl.”

Henry clutched it. “This one.”

“You can’t keep it, Hen. This isn’t the bookseller’s.”

“Be that as it may,” Regina interjected. “You are welcome to borrow it.”

“Really?”

As if she could refuse those eager eyes anything. She’d already forgiven him his tantrum. She’d never really blamed him to begin with.

Henry pushed the book against her chest. “You read it,” he said.

“Hen,” Emma groaned.

“Problem, Miss Swan?”

Henry giggled, which made Emma’s frown all the more delicious.

“If the child wants a story, he shall have a story,” Regina said, helping Henry down from his perch. She sat in the chair and the boy climbed in her lap. He wasn’t heavy, but she was hyper-aware of his presence there. Children did not sit in her lap for a story like she was some doting grandmother or auntie. It was unnatural.

Emma hoisted herself onto Regina’s desk. Not the chair, the table top. She swung her legs. Regina knew she was doing it on purpose, and tried not to let it bother her. Henry fumbled to open the book, but his fingers were small and clumsy. Regina chuckled and took the volume in her nimble fingers, and once it was there, a dull melancholy filled her gut. The pages crinkled upon opening. They smelled heavy and sweet. The scent that had filled her father’s study. Pipe smoke and leather. The musk of old books.

“This,” she began. “Is the story of a girl, and a rose, and a sheep, who all lived together in a sunny patch of woodland…”

The melody of the words brought her comfort as she read them. The melancholy turned to sweet nostalgia. At some point, Henry began to turn the pages for her, but not before he made her pause so he could have more time to study the pictures.

It wasn’t a very long story. It was rather short, as stories went. But Regina felt herself transported to a dream-like place where time and memory had no meaning. She could have been a little girl, and it could have been Rosemary on her lap, and her father could be watching fondly from his desk as he smoked a pipe. The chestnut one, maybe, which had a trio of dragons flying off the end where the smoke puffed out. This her haven, where Cora would not go. No one lost or dead. No empty, starving landscape.

Henry tapped her cheek. She flinched from his touch.

He rearranged himself to kneel on her thighs. She didn’t understand.

“You finished the story,” came a voice from the desk.

Emma was there. She’d forgotten.

“Ah. Yes. Well…”

“Bed time now, I think,” Emma said.

Regina nodded. “Most assuredly.”

“Your…delivery is downstairs,” Emma added.

“Thank you.”

“Come on Henry.”

He bounced off Regina’s lap and let himself be lifted into his mother’s arms.

“What do you say?”

He tucked his head in Emma’s neck and smiled shyly at Regina. “Thank you for the story.”

“You’re very welcome, Henry.”

((()))

Emma couldn’t sleep because she couldn’t stop thinking about the story.

She was trying to remember where she’d heard it before.

Henry snuffled at her side. She stroked his hair.

It might have been one of Granny’s stories. But the feeling of knowing went deeper than that. Like something she’d heard once in a dream. Not a recollection that was solid, that she could hold. More like a wisp of a memory in the back of her mind.

The other reason she couldn’t sleep was the knowledge of what Regina was doing in the dungeon, possibly right at that exact moment. And the fact that Emma herself had helped facilitate it.

She’d done lots of illegal things in her lifetime, but none that had directly resulted in a man’s death. Not that he didn’t deserve it. Theoretically, anyway. But the reality…it felt big. She’d lied and cheated and stole, but that had been to survive. She’d never taken a man’s life. Handing them over to Regina, she was as good as ripping their hearts out herself.

Henry whimpered in his sleep and she rubbed his back, the way he liked, with her fingertips. The truth was, she wouldn’t go back and make a different choice. For Henry, she’d take Regina’s deal a hundred times over. She wouldn’t have to think twice. What were a few con-men and cutthroats to her, in the face of Henry’s life? She didn’t have the right to feel guilty. She wasn’t remorseful. She didn’t regret it. She’d do it over and over and over again, for him.

Her sleep was restless and uneasy, and eventually she woke in the dead of night and couldn’t sink back into unconsciousness. She checked on Henry and then slipped out of bed, going to stand at the window and look out at the view of the village. They were too high up to distinguish individual buildings, but she could pinpoint the general area where the tavern stood.

The lamps had been dimmed, so she could only see a vague outline of buildings. Granny was alone there, with the stiffness in her limbs and clouds coming over her irises, making it hard to move and see. Emma had vowed to return as often as she could. Granny had pursed her lips and appeared unconvinced, but she didn’t try to dissuade Emma, which maybe scared her most of all.

Red would see it as abandonment. Emma didn’t disagree. She wondered if she’d have a home to go back to. She wondered if she’d want to go back. Maybe this was a sign. It was time to move on. She’d taken enough from these lives that weren’t hers.

In the morning she took Henry to be checked on by Regina. Regina chatted amicably with Henry as she did the standard check-ups of his pulse, the insides of his mouth and ears, his lungs. Then she did that thing again, the thing where she placed her hand on Henry’s chest and Henry seemed to light up from the inside for a second, which of course delighted him and terrified Emma. She couldn’t help calling to mind the image of Regina, her hand on that same place on Grimm’s chest, right before she reached inside and plucked out his heart. She knew Regina had done the same thing with Hamzl, once Emma had drugged him, tied his hands and feet, stuffed a kerchief in his mouth so he couldn’t shout for help, and dumped him in the dungeon. His body was still down there, probably. Dead? She didn’t know what happened when you took someone’s heart. Could you live without it?

“Do you have kids?” Emma blurted when the examination was over and Henry was delightedly inspecting a small orb of swirling smoke that Regina had promised he could hold in return for standing still.

Regina, who had been writing, paused and held her pen aloft. “Excuse me?”

“It’s just…” Emma blushed and scuffed her foot on the ground. “You’re so…easy with him.”

Light pink tinged Regina’s cheeks. Though it might have just been the sun on her face. But Emma couldn’t help thinking she was pleased. Which startled her more than anything, because it was such a vapid, human thing.

“I don’t have children, Miss Swan,” Regina said softly. They both had their eyes on Henry, who’d lost interest in the orb in exchange for a gold medallion. “But…” She fidgeted. “I was unkind to a child once. And, sometimes, I can’t help but wonder if things would have turned out differently if I had only treated her with a little bit of dignity.”

“What happened to her?” Emma couldn’t help asking.

Regina cleared her throat. “To be honest…I don’t know.I was a child myself at the time, and I didn’t know how to ask the right questions.”

“I don’t blame myself for anything I did as a kid.”

Regina smiled ruefully. “Miss Swan, you’re still practically a child yourself.”

“I’m past my twentieth birthday. I take offense at that.”

Regina shook her head. “Only a child would.”

Emma made a face at her, and Regina was kind enough not to point out that this, too, proved her point. Emma almost grinned until she remembered who, exactly, she would have been grinning at.

“My point is,” Emma said. “I did all sorts of awful things as a kid. To survive, you know? I lied and stole a lot, and got in fights all the time. Some that weren’t strictly necessary, I was just mad at the world.”

“You were an orphan. You can’t blame yourself for the circumstances of your birth,” Regina said.

“Exactly.”

“That doesn’t apply to me, Miss Swan. I should have known better. I was born into wealth and privilege. I don’t have any excuses. I was cruel and demeaning and it cost a girl her life.”

Emma winced.

Regina bit her lip, and lowered her eyes. “I apologize. I didn’t intend to be so candid.”

“No, I…well, it’s nice to know you have some remorse.”

Regina snorted. “Not enough, as you’re well aware.”

“I——Regina.” She said her name deliberately. “It doesn’t have to be this way.”

Regina smiled sadly. “Yes, it does.”

“Whatever it is, you don’t——” She lowered her voice. “You don’t have to kil——take hearts for it. There has to be another way. Whatever trouble you’re in…well, I’ve been in trouble lots of times. I can help get you out of it. That can be our bargain, instead.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Miss Swan.”

“Of course I don’t. You won’t tell me anything.”

“I explained this already. The less you know, the better.”

“But why——”

“Because,” Regina snapped. “There are forces at work here far beyond your control. Beyond even my control. I have untold power. I am the strongest apprentice the Dark One has ever had. But none of that means anything if I’m locked up and left to rot in this tower.”

“If you’re so strong, get out of it.”

“I can’t,” Regina hissed. “The bind was cast by two sorcerers who equal my power each by themselves…the two of them working together…” She shook her head. “You assume too much, Miss Swan.”

“I wouldn’t have to assume if you’d just tell me,” Emma muttered.

“I——are you pouting?”

Emma kicked the leg of the desk. “No.”

“Don’t be a child.”

“I’m not a child.”

“Then stop acting childish.”

“I’d just like to know what I’m sending men to die for. That’s all.”

Regina rubbed her temples as if she were making a great effort to restrain herself. “Yes, Miss Swan, while we are sacrificing a few bad men’s lives, we are doing so for the sake of thousands of others.”

“Don’t say we. I am not your accomplice.”

“Aren’t you, though?” Regina gritted her teeth. “Look, you need to understand that this is a matter of life and death. I wouldn’t do it this way if it wasn’t absolutely necessary. I need you to be satisfied with that.”

“Well, now I just have more questions.”

“’Gina!”

Henry’s voice cut above their furious whispers. His face appeared over the top of the desk. He placed the golden medallion on its surface with a thud.

“Gentle, Henry!”

“It’s all right, Miss Swan.” Regina turned the medallion over in her palm. “Where did you find this?”

Henry gestured vaguely to one of the shelves on the other side of the room. “Wa’s that?” He pointed to an image impounded on the medallion.

“Ah. It’s a mill.”

“A what?”

“A mill. Mine is a family of millers.”

“That’s mundane,” Emma said.

“It’s the truth.”

“I didn’t say you were lying.”

Regina glared.

“Wa’s a miller?”

Regina lifted Henry onto her lap and he knelt on her thighs, holding the medallion between them. “A place where grain is ground into flour.”

“Flour in Granny’s,” Henry said, making the only connection he had.

Regina tilted her head, seeming puzzled, so Emma said, “Yes, Henry. Just like that.”

“Cookies,” Henry added with a sly grin.

Regina understood that. “This medallion has a magic power,” she said.

Henry gazed up at her with the widest green eyes. Emma’s heart was twisted all in knots looking at him, and loving him, and being terrified by the depths of that love.

“Come.” Regina set Henry ever so gently on the floor and stood. She offered Henry her hand and led him to a blank expanse of wall, which had been covered by a massive tapestry. The tapestry depicted a mill as its centerpiece, but dancing around it were all manner of mystical creatures of the forest. Unicorns and griffins and giant golden eagles. And ordinary animals, hunting dogs and pigs and horses.

Regina drew the tapestry aside and revealed a circular indentation in the wall where the medallion fit perfectly. She instructed Henry to insert and then turn it to the right. He did so, and it was followed by a click, then a steady rumble that lasted several seconds. Henry jumped backwards into Regina. She placed her hands on his shoulders. “I’m sorry, I should have warned you. It’s nothing scary, I promise.”

She left one hand on Henry’s shoulder and used the other to grip the medallion and pull, which revealed a doorway as it detached from the wall.

Henry was quivering in anticipation. Secret doorways and hidden passages were the stuff of stories, for him, ones that Granny and Red had been spinning for him since before he could talk.

The stairway was narrow and dark.

“It opens at the top,” Regina promised.

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“C’mon, Mama.” Henry curled his hands around her fingers, but he didn’t need to worry. There was no way she was letting him follow shady witches into secret stairwells by himself.

Regina went first, Emma suspected on purpose, to prove that the path was secure.

Henry was strung between them, one hand each attached to Regina and Emma, respectively.

Emma wanted to trust Henry’s judgment. She really did. Red always said that children were the best judges of character. When Henry was nervous around a stranger at the tavern, she made a point to keep an extra eye on them.

The problem was that Henry’s judgment, in this case, flew in the face of what Emma knew to be true.

She wished Red were here, to tell her what to do. Red was a pretty good judge of character, too. Emma considered herself a biased party. She mistrusted people unilaterally. It had kept her alive for twenty-odd years. However old she was. The orphanage hadn’t kept a record, or else whoever dumped her there hadn’t said. She definitely hadn’t been a baby because she had very indistinct, shadowy memories of that time.

She did remember the men. She remembered the scams, the conmen, the pickpockets, the other children who stole lunch right out of her hands when she was still too little to land a punch. She remembered Bael. She remembered Bael very well. She kept him as a sharp, vivid reminder in the back of her head to be careful when other people asked you to trust them.

Henry hadn’t been raised on such hard-knock ideologies. He had always been warm and safe and loved. Humans, for him, were loud and messy and raucous, but also kind and gentle and funny, and he trusted implicitly that his mother and auntie and Granny would never let any harm come to him. He didn’t know this, consciously. But it was in the way he talked to people, in the bold way he carried himself when he met strangers, the eagerness he had for stories. Life was an adventure, not a battle-front.

At the top of the staircase was a ladder that ended in a locked wooden hatch. Regina climbed the ladder and removed a key from a string on her waist that Emma hadn’t noticed before. She tried to see where Regina tucked it when she was done, but Regina must have sensed her watching, because she angled away for a moment to adjust the key back on her person.

Light flooded the muted space as Regina pushed open the hatch and climbed the rest of the way to the top.

Emma balanced behind Henry, but he navigated the ladder rungs more easily than she’d expected, with only a little bit of breathlessness at the top.

She lifted him over the lip of the roof and hoisted herself up after him. For a moment she didn’t realize what she was seeing. It was too bright. The colors were a shock to her senses after days wallowing in the gray stone walls of the castle, and the scent was overpowering in its headiness. Thick and heavy and damp.

Granny tended a vegetable garden in a small square plot behind the kitchen back home, but it was nothing like this.

Emma hadn’t seen this kind of color before. It felt like a strike through the chest. She hadn’t known this kind of color could exist. The darkest of reds, the most striking of oranges, gentle violet buds and tall proud yellow sunflowers. A tree with the crispest, shiniest green apples. A butterfly darted by, and several red-breasted birds twittered in the bushes.

Henry crouched in the dirt and found a lizard the length of his thumb. It let Henry hold and stroke it. It had a faint, purplish sheen.

“So. Is this where you grow your poisons?” Emma asked Regina.

“The poisonous strains are fenced in over there,” Regina said.

Emma blinked. She couldn’t tell if that was a joke or not.

She had a feeling…not.

“Do you use those often?”

“Poison?”

Emma shrugged.

Regina laughed. “Let me guess: you think I sit up there in my tower concocting ways to torture people for no reason.”

“I wasn’t thinking anything.”

“I’ve noticed that’s a pattern of behavior with you.”

Emma gave her a dirty look. That had almost been…funny. In a sharp and thorny kind of way.

_She rips out people’s hearts and eats them for breakfast._

But what did she care, if it meant Henry’s life? What code of morality was she suddenly following that made her want to defend these men? When had she ever cared?

Well, she blamed Henry, obviously, and Red and Granny.

She’d come to terms with the fact that life was a load of horseshit. She’d made her peace with it. Bael had taught her that lesson, once and for all. She’d always thought he was her last hope. Her last chance at something like happiness.

She would have been content to waste away in that bed, those first months of Henry’s life. Red and Granny would’ve made sure he had a good life; they’d treated him like their own from the moment he was born. Come to think of it, they’d treated her like their own, too.

The problem was that Emma didn’t know how to belong to people. She didn’t know how to let them belong to her. Her life was one farce after another. She fell in love and was betrayed. She started to love her child just as he started to die. Loving wasn’t the same as belonging. Love didn’t always mean home.

“Miss Swan.”

Regina was watching her in concern.

Emma rubbed the back of her neck, which beaded with sweat from the sun.

“You went away there, for a moment.”

“I’m fine.”

She felt Regina’s eyes still on her as she sought out Henry in the sunflower patch. The stalks stood taller than both of them. He spun in a wide, wondrous circle. He stood on his tiptoes to touch the brown center of the blooms.

“Look, Mama!”

“I see,” she whispered.

“Look!”

She cleared her throat. “I am.”

When she looked again, Regina was no longer at her side, but stood at the parapets looking out at the great expanse of pine forests and mountains beyond.

It occurred to Emma, for the first time, looking at that solitary figure set against the backdrop of the dawn, how alone here Regina really was.

You didn’t think about witches being lonely. You didn’t think about witches feeling anything at all. Their motives were obscure, they kept their secrets close. For all she knew, Regina enjoyed her solitude. Emma couldn’t begrudge her that. She missed it sometimes too, the silent nights, by herself on some rooftop, eating a meat pie and watching the stars. Nothing for her to worry about except where her next meal was coming from. She’d believed, once, that starvation was the worst fate to fear.

She approached the Witch and stood at her side.

“You’re asking me to trust you,” she said.

“It makes no difference to me, if you trust me or not.”

“As long as I keep doing your dirty work, right?”

Regina flexed her hand pointedly. “I believe I’m the one doing the dirty work here, Miss Swan.”

She didn’t seem menacing in that moment. She sounded resigned. Almost sad. But it could have been a trick of the light. The beauty of the garden could’ve softened Emma’s perception of her edges.

“If there was…another way…to do…whatever it is you’re doing…”

“Believe me,” Regina said. “I looked for years for another way. There is nothing more powerful than the magic of a beating heart.”

“And this…danger…when is it coming?”

“It’s already here.”

“What? Where?”

“Everywhere. It’s always been here. Ever since I was a girl. Maybe since before you were born. How old did you say you were?”

“Twenty-two.”

“Hmm. Almost exactly to the year, then.”

“I don’t understa…never mind.”

“Ah.” Regina smirked.

“What?”

“I was taking bets with myself, when you’d finally learn to keep your mouth shut. I must say, you exceeded my expectations.”

“I’m sorry, what?” Emma asked, outraged.

Regina laughed.

For a moment, it almost sounded like a witch’s cackle.


	8. Chapter Eight

Red was being followed.

She couldn’t say for sure. She didn’t dare double back. But the hairs on the back of her neck prickled. The place where her hackles would have stood at attention in wolf form stiffened. Goosebumps popped on her forearms.

Her senses didn’t lie.

They were, however, stronger in her wolf form. She had vowed not to transform once she crossed the border, but she felt so exposed, in her fleshy human body with its rounded nails and dull teeth. As a wolf, her very body was weaponized. She was grounded, glorious.

Like this, she was just a human, as weak and soft as any other human. And without a weapon, too, since they had been removed from her belt at the border. She should have worked harder to conceal them, but she was a fool. What had she been thinking? At this rate, it would be weeks before she reached the capitol, and by then it might be too late for Henry. She should’ve just stayed. Enjoyed as many of his last minutes with him as possible.

A wolf could have covered more distance at a faster rate. But it was too late now. If she was going to change, she should have done it as soon as she crossed the border and was covered by the shelter of the trees. She’d waited too long. There were eyes on her. If she changed form now, they’d witness it.

It had to be a guard or a soldier…definitely a human. They didn’t allow shape-shifters on this side of the border. Red gritted her teeth. Of course she had insisted on testing their defenses. If she so much as bared her teeth or a tuft of fur grew in on her neck, she’d be stuck full of arrows before she could blink.

She had no choice. She had to keep moving. Prove that she was who she’d claimed to be. But the snow was heavy and deep. Her boots and the fringes of Emma’s cloak were soaked through. She’d lost feeling in her extremities long ago. She ached for her wolf form. She dreamed of just a moment covered in her thick, chestnut-colored coat, the heavy padding of her paws that were made for these exact conditions.

She pictured Henry’s face, flushed with fever. She imagined Emma, sitting at his bedside, that morose expression on her face that she carried around wherever she went. If she didn’t succeed, that expression would become permanent. Emma would shatter. She was already an amalgamation of cracked pieces, painstakingly arranged back together after breaking again and again. There were only so many tragedies she could survive before fracturing beyond repair.

Red had only ever had Granny, growing up. And truly, that was all anyone really needed. She had never doubted her own worth. She had never questioned for a moment that she was loved. She was doted on and nurtured and shaped into a woman of strength and self-reliance. She was fed and clothed and supported through the difficult years of puberty, when her transformation was most painful to bear.

But Emma, despite being abused and scorned and cast aside, had something that Red and Granny didn’t. She was all gut. She loved harder than anyone Red had ever met. She resented just as hard, too. That’s why she shut down when the world battered and bruised her and spit her back up. She had built her walls so high and strong that when they came down, they pulverized. Red remembered those days after Henry’s birth. Emma hadn’t moved from bed for six months. She’d wasted away. Didn’t want to touch food. Refused to let Henry’s name be spoken in her presence. At least she had named him. She’d had the wherewithal for that, right after he’d kicked and screamed his way from her womb.

Red was positive that Emma had been trying to die. It was pure happenstance that she hadn’t succeeded. She’d come awfully close. Red dreaded seeing that happen again. Emma might be disillusioned, but she couldn’t disguise her heart. She’d never been able to. She’d attached herself to Red and Granny from the start, a lost puppy starving for the measliest scraps of attention. She postured to the world, but never to Red.

Red had meant what she’d said to Emma before they separated at the border. They were sisters, as sure as if they had shared the same blood, been born from the same womb.

Sister was the sort of thing she’d never known she needed. But from the moment Emma had stumbled through the door, skin purpling with frostbite, on the verge of hypothermia, they’d been tied together. Red had curled up that night, next to Emma, in her wolf form, to keep her warm. Emma, freezing and feverish, had buried her fingers into Red’s fur and drifted in and out of delirium.

Red had never stopped taking care of her. And in return, Emma had given her every ounce of devotion and loyalty she was capable of. Red hadn’t known that sort of ferocious, protective love was possible. Not until Emma.

Hence why she found herself ankle-deep in snow, miles from civilization, and now, potentially, stalked through the woods by men who would kill her if they suspected for an instant that she was not like them.

A shadow passed on her right. She twisted around; a growl rumbled in her throat. Still distinctly human-sounding, but on the verge of something else.

The shadow passed again. It dodged between trees, a silhouette against the backdrop of white. Red lowered the hood of her cloak so her line of sight wouldn’t be obstructed. She braced herself in the snow, hairline rising. She’d change and kill them. If it came to that. A trail of bodies was the antithesis of discretion, but she needed to reach that capitol.

Her muscles rippled, tensed to fight.

The shadow didn’t reappear.

Sweat chilled under her collar as she panted and gasped, twisting around in the snow. But the shadow was gone, and now she had freezing sweat to contend with.

She didn’t know whether to be relieved. It could have just been an animal in the woods. A passerby. Uneasy, she drew up her cloak and decided to find a shelter for the rest of the evening. She could wait out the storm in some alcove or cave, and dry her outer-garments. She wasn’t likely to get much farther by nightfall anyway, and she wouldn’t be helping anyone if she was exhausted and hungry and freezing to death.

She trudged on for a while until she found a dug-out patch of dirt beneath the refuge of a thistle patch. It wasn’t ideal. The ground was freezing. But the brush kept the snow off and she might have the chance to dry off by morning. Sniffling, she crawled into shelter and bunkered down under her cloak, prying a hard lump of bread from her pocket and sucking on it until it was soft enough to swallow. 

((()))

The Dark One arrived at dinner. Regina sensed his presence before he appeared, though he hadn’t sent a notice of his return. It produced a slithering, creeping sensation up her spine to the hairs on the back of her neck. She could always tell.

This time, not soon enough.

She stood from the table. “Emma,” she said. “Take Henry upstairs.”

“Why? What’s wrong?”

“Emma.”

Emma must have seen something in her face. She wiped her mouth and shuffled Henry out of his seat. “But desert,” he protested.

“Shush,” Emma said.

It didn’t matter. Regina had let her guard down. Emma and Henry didn’t have time to get out of the dining hall before the Dark One was sweeping in, laying his heavy, velvet green cloak on the table and scanning the room with his face patched with scales.

His gaze landed on Emma, who shunted Henry behind her.

When the Dark One smiled his teeth glinted like knives. Regina was told that once he had looked like a man, but now he had more the appearance of a reptile, with leathery flesh and inhuman eyes, slitted like a snake’s.

Regina angled herself towards Emma and Henry. The Dark One’s gaze flashed and caught it.

He bowed to the three. “The Dark One himself,” he said. “At your service. And who might this lovely lady be?”

“Emma. Emma Swan.” To her credit, Emma’s voice didn’t falter. Regina was impressed by the straightness of her spine, the setting of shoulders. Not many would refuse to be cowed in the Dark One’s presence. But then, she shouldn’t have been surprised. This was no different from how Emma had introduced herself to Regina on that first day of their meeting.

The only difference was that Henry hadn’t been there. And neither of them missed the tight grip Emma had on her son’s shoulders.

“Emma Swan.” The Dark One’s eyes glittered as he circled the table, which extended the length of the room and could easily sit fifty people. Though when it ever had, Regina had no idea. It had never been more than just her and the Dark One and the servants in the Keep.

“Fascinating,” the Dark One said. He arrived in front of the woman and child and peered into Emma’s face. “Very fascinating.”

Eventually he extended his hand in greeting and Emma had no choice but to meet it. “Pleasure,” she muttered.

The Dark One threw back his head and laughed. “Pleasure? A pleasure? To meet me? You have the most peculiar taste, my dear,” he said to Regina. “Where did you find her?” He shook his head and gazed at Emma in wonder. “Fascinating. And who is this young fellow?”

He crouched on the balls of his feet, intensifying the reptilian appearance.

“Henry,” the boy said, peering from behind Emma’s knee. His eyes green eyes were wide and round as they cataloged the strangeness of this new man.

“Do I know you?” Emma blurted.

The Dark One straightened. He raised an eyebrow; every movement he made was done to theatrical extremes. “Know me?” He chortled. “Everyone knows me, Emma Swan, though they may have never seen my face. I am the granter of wishes. Vessel for your deepest desires. I am the bargain-maker, or the con-man, depending on who you ask. I am not real, yet not imaginary. I exist because people want me to exist. I am an amalgamation of every hope and fear and desire ever dreamed up by humankind. Everyone knows me because they need me to exist, to have someone to blame when their dreams lie dead at their feet and they realize that life is a scam.”

Henry whimpered.

The Dark One’s pupils were bloated.

“Alright,” Regina said. “That’s enough.”

The Dark One shrugged. “She asked.”

“Is there something you need?” Regina demanded. “Besides taunting my guests.”

“No welcome home for me then?”

“I can’t think of anything welcome about it.”

The Dark One struck his chest. “You wound me.”

Regina sighed; she rubbed her temple and asked again, “What do you want?”

“Only to see the strangers you’ve let into my keep.”

“I wasn’t aware there was a rule against my having guests.”

“There’s not.” The Dark One smiled between Regina and Emma, showing all his teeth. “But in ten years you’ve never taken the liberty. I only wanted to see the kind of person who’d finally caught your attention.”

“Is that why you’re here? Curiosity? Don’t you have better things to do?”

“Living a few millennium or so gives you a certain perspective, you know, Regina. You can afford to indulge your curiosities. The mayhem and madness will still be there when you’re done. Anyhow——” He circled Emma, who arranged herself to always stand between him and Henry. “I see I’ve disturbed your supper. How rude of me.” He gave a brisk wave to the servant standing in the corner. “Have my chambers prepared and tell the chef to send my meal to the library.”

“Right away, Master,” the servant murmured, bowing quickly and scurrying through the double doors in the direction of the kitchen.

“Ladies.” The Dark One bowed low. “And young sir.” He winked at Henry, who looked amazed. “I’ll be off then.”

He looked a moment like he was going to take the door, then smirked at Regina from behind Emma’s head and in a billow of purple smoke, clapped his hands and vanished.

“Show-off,” Regina muttered.

“Magic, Mama,” Henry said, clinging to her leg. He looked unsure whether to be frightened or thrilled.

Regina stood on the other side of the table, where the gravy from their dinner congealed on china that was rarely used. It had been a gift from her mother, intended for when she was married. Selling your daughter to a queen was the same as selling her to a sorcerer, in Cora’s estimation.

“I’m sorry, Miss Swan,” she said. “He wasn’t supposed to be returning for a month, at least.”

Emma said in monotone, “It’s fine.”

So Regina took it as being not fine, at all. She summoned a servant to escort them back to their quarters. If the Dark One decided to intercept them, at least they wouldn’t be alone. She got the feeling that Emma didn’t want to see her, just then. They’d reached a sort of equilibrium in their working relationship. Emma trusted her with Henry, up to a certain point. And she had stopped questioning Regina’s motives. Regina had the suspicion that she had convinced herself that this was like any other job, and Regina was just another version of the sheriff, doling out due justice.

But now, at the Dark One’s appearance, she was beginning to remember all the reasons why she shouldn’t trust Regina. And she wasn’t wrong. If Regina’s plan got out and Emma was implicated, it made her just as culpable. What would happen to Henry, then? She cursed herself for not anticipating the Dark One’s arrival sooner. But of course, the Dark One had probably orchestrated that on purpose, using the element of surprise to ensure she couldn’t make preparations to hide whatever she may or may not have to hide.

Because he didn’t trust her either. And well, what had he expected, keeping her locked up in here? That she would thank him for it? He’d made the mistake of giving her all this power and then realizing he didn’t want her to use it. But it was too late. The spell was well on its way. And Emma knew too much to get rid of her now.

Besides, if she fired Emma, she’d lose Henry. And Henry would lose his chance at survival. She hadn’t told Emma, but the more in tune she became with him, the more she feared there was something deeply wrong with the boy, something more than a natural-born illness. She didn’t know how or why, but somehow magic had gotten a hold of him. It clutched him deep, deep down, so ingrained that she had almost missed it. A sickly, gray-colored magic whose source she couldn’t identify. So far, her topical treatments had done the job of staving off symptoms. But Emma was waiting for the magical fix she had promised, and Henry’s life depended on it.

She ascended the steps to her tower alone and settled down for a long night. She had extracted a thread of gray magic from Henry’s chest and bottled it. Magic, true magic, usually came with a signature of the person who’d created it. Whether intentional or not, it bore the marks of its maker. But this she didn’t recognize, and if she couldn’t decode it alone, eventually she’d have to turn to the Dark One for help, or worse, her mother. What she couldn’t understand was why anyone would want to target Henry, and the likely answer was: to get to Emma. It was reasonable to consider that Emma might have made an enemy or two, on account of the job that she did, but most of those men were low-grade scum with few connections to serious magic-types.

Which meant there might be something else going on. The threads of gray magic had a complex woven texture, nothing nature could have produced on its own. It draped over her hands like silk, and glinted with an inner light that nearly illuminated Regina’s entire study. Only a human could have cast such taught, fine threads of magic.

Which meant someone was making Henry sick on purpose.

Regina worked long into the night. Emma didn’t know the truth. She intended to keep it from her for as long as it took her to create her own resistant strain of magic. There was no point in Emma worrying. She was already worried enough.

Regina had fallen right into the trap of wanting to protect them. Emma and Henry both. The Dark One was right. She was halfway still a little girl, taking in injured birds and sickly puppies and lambs rejected by their mothers.

A bang came on the door. Regina sighed. She’d been waiting for this. The Dark One could never leave her alone for long. There was no one else around to torment.

“Well?” she said. “Come in then.”

The hinges creaked and the door swung open. It wasn’t the Dark One.  
  
Emma stood in the doorway dressed in a pair of satin pajamas that a servant had procured. Patches of the satin were dark with sweat and there were hollows under her eyes.

Regina shot to her feet. “Is Henry——”

“Henry’s fine.”

Regina lowered herself sheepishly.

“I came for me, actually,” Emma admitted, rubbing up and down her arm and avoiding Regina’s gaze. “You uh…got anything for bad dreams?”

Regina tilted her head and smiled. In the middle of all this. Such an easy thing. Such a simple request. “You know, as a matter of fact, I do.”

——

The kettle hissed and sang in the kitchen. Steam condensed on its surface. Regina cupped an oven mitt and removed the kettle from the flames.

Emma perched on a wooden stood at the table, a rectangular service that extended the length of the kitchen, where the chef prepared food and the servants took their meals. But everyone was in bed at this hour, and the two of them had the hollowed out dome of the kitchen to themselves.

Regina poured the boiling water over tea leaves into two clay mugs, and set one before Emma.

“What is it?” Emma asked. The suspicion Regina hadn’t heard in a while was back in her voice. She reminded herself that Emma had come to her, had asked her for help. That belied some sort of trust.

“It’s chamomile, Miss Swan,” she said, hiding a smile behind the rim of her mug.

Emma narrowed her eyes. “I meant like, a magic…potion, or concoction, or whatever you call them. So I could sleep without the blasted dreams.”

“Chamomile is its own kind of magic,” Regina said with a smirk. “My father brewed it for me when I couldn’t sleep as a child. Of course, he added some secret ingredient or other that I’ve never been able to replicate. Sugar?”

Emma nodded, and was silent while Regina fixed their tea with milk and honey.

“Stir it well,” she said, passing Emma the mug and a silver spoon. For a moment, the only sound was the gentle tink of their silverware.

“This is all that most magic is,” Regina said, watching her tea grow dark and creamy. “At least, what people think of as magic. A careful combination of natural ingredients. Herbs and seeds and the like. I can grow most of them right here in my garden.”

“But what about the…” Emma made a flickering gesture with her hands. “You know. Those lights Henry likes.”

“That’s different,” Regina said. “You’re either born with that or you’re not. And if you aren’t, it doesn’t come cheap. The magic always demands a price.”

“Were you? Born with it?”

Regina circled the rim of her mug. “I was not.”

Emma sipped her tea and closed her eyes. “I guess I see what you mean,” she said. “It’s soothing.”

“You’ve never had chamomile before?”

Emma frowned. “Granny——I mean, a friend of mine makes it for Henry sometimes, for the cough. I spooned it for him.”

“I have warm memories associated with tea. You never, as a child…?”

Emma shifted uncomfortably. “Woulda been a luxury. Mags at the orphanage didn’t have the extra money for that kind of thing.”

“You’re an orphan.”

Emma quirked her lips in a not-quite-smile. “That’s me.”

“I didn’t know.”

“You knew everything else about me, it seems.”

“I knew your capabilities. Your usefulness to me. I didn’t go prying into every intimate detail of your life, Miss Swan.”

“Is that how you see people? By their usefulness to you?”

“Most of the time, yes.”

She watched Emma contemplate that and sipped her own tea. It wasn’t something she had often. The taste of it flew her back a dozen years to another realm, sitting in a kitchen much homelier than this one, listening to her father tell stories at the table while he brewed her tea to help her sleep. She’d had trouble sleeping, in those days. She’d just started having nightmares about Rosemary, again. That was around when she was fifteen. A few years later, Cora sent her to the Dark One’s keep and she never saw her father again.

“The Dark One wasn’t what I expected,” Emma said.

Regina snorted. “He’s rarely what anyone expects.”

“He wasn’t as…”

“Intimidating?”

“…Dark as I thought he would be.”

Regina nodded. “To many, he seems like a harmless trickster. Slippery and slimy and rude, to be sure, but not dangerous.”

“They don’t know his reputation?”

Regina placed her mug on the table and sighed. “People look at the Dark One and see an imp. A cackling lunatic. They bargain away their house or their sons or their livelihoods. They think, I can outwit this man. But he isn’t a man. And no one can outwit the Dark One. Don’t cross him, Emma.”

Emma smiled wryly. “Like they say not to cross you?”

Regina waved her hand dismissively. “My reputation is just that. Smoke and mirrors, based on rumors and speculation. I can’t leave the keep and they never see me, so they have to write my story for themselves.”

“Is that the price you paid?”

“Excuse me?”

“For magic,” Emma said in realization. “That’s why you can’t leave. Your freedom is the price you paid.”

Regina tilted her head. She regarded Emma thoughtfully. Then she said, “That would make a good story, wouldn’t it?”

Emma ducked her head, blushing, and focused on her tea for several minutes. The clock ticked on the wall, a little past one in the morning. Moonlight filtered in from the windows. Emma’s golden hair funneled down around her shoulders. The sweat stains on her shirt had dried but she still looked wrung out and hollow.

“In my dream,” she said suddenly. “The Dark One was there.” She glanced around, as if just saying his name would invoke his appearance.

Well. She wasn’t wrong.

“The Dark One gives most people nightmares,” Regina said.

“No,” Emma said. “It wasn’t a nightmare. It was him and me standing in a room that was dark, and his face was silvery, and it’s all I could see. We just stood there and he watched me. Then he grinned and his face was more like a skull that all the skin had been sucked off of. Then I woke up.”

Regina was troubled. Emma was right. This didn’t sound like a nightmare. This sounded more like a visitation.

“Listen,” she said. “The Dark One is always playing games. He likes to tease and taunt. He came home and found you in his house and wanted to intimidate you. That’s all.”

“So he was there. Actually there, in my head?”

Regina bit her lip. “I can’t tell you that for sure. It really could have been a very vivid nightmare.”

“But you don’t believe that.”

Regina huffed. A tiny smile crept on the corner of her mouth. “I forget what it’s like, sometimes, to have people around that can see through me. And aren’t afraid to talk back.”

The grin that widened on Emma’s mouth was almost worth it. “So you admit I can see through you.”

“I didn’t say that.” Regina raised her mug. “But nevertheless, a kind of magic ability in itself.”

Emma giggled and tentatively knocked their mugs together. She looked pleased with herself. Her laugh was high and soft like bells. It was gentle but hesitant, like the mirth might be snatched from her any second. Regina found herself wanting to give it a reason to stay.

The steam from their tea settled in the air, and the moon drifted through the heavens as the night wallowed on. The kitchen was frigid without the ovens running. Regina’s garden was the only place not at the whim of changing seasons.

“So what do you think?” Emma asked. “About my dream?”

“You know,” said a voice. “You could just ask me.”

The Dark one did not look like he ever slept. He stood head to toe in his leathery suit, which glistened with a metallic sheen in the lamplight.

He sprang onto the tabletop and crouched there. “I told you, Emma Swan,” he said, twirling a lock of her hair. “You fascinate me. You’re like one of Regina’s experiments upstairs. I need time to study you.”

Emma jerked away from his fingers. “Don’t touch me, please,” she said in monotone, not giving any other indication with her body or voice that she was repulsed by him.

She’d faced up to bullies before, Regina realized.

But she had never met anyone like the Dark One and she was going to get herself killed.

“She works for me,” Regina said. “She’s under my protection. You can have your turn when I’m done with her.”

The Dark One sneered. “Little Regina Mills, always so protective of her pets. You should tell Emma the story of what happened to that horse of yours. What was his name again?”

“Leave,” Regina hissed. They’d been through this routine before. She felt sick inside, and loathed him, and a lick of flames crawled under the surface of her skin. One of these days, she wanted to burn that smug little smirk right off his face.

“Did I say something?” The Dark One held a hand to his chest in mock innocence. “Emma, do you know what usually happens to Regina’s lost, broken pets?”

“I can guess,” Emma gritted. She stared defiantly right in his eyes, still not backing down. Regina was going to have to have a talk with her about that.

“Well,” the Dark One let out a sigh. “I suppose I’ll just leave you to your guesses. As it seems I’m not welcome here.” He raised his eyebrows pointedly at Regina, then flitted off the table and straightened himself, smoothing the creases in his suit before performing an extended bow. He retreated to the shadows of the kitchen, outside of the lamplight, but Regina didn’t relax until she heard the double doors swing shut behind him, and could no longer smell his hideous odor in the air. He smelled like rotting meat, or burning flesh, or swamp muck. Depending on where you stood in relation to his body.

Emma drew in a ragged breath as she sank back down in her seat.

Regina joined her at the table, steering clear of the prints the Dark One had left with his boots. “He enjoys antagonizing people.”

“No kidding.”

“You have nothing to fear from him, Emma.”

“Oh no?”

“Not while I’m here.”

Emma sat up in alarm. “What about Henry?”

Regina waved her hand, encouraging Emma to relax. “Henry too. And…listen.” She looked into her tea, now cold. “If…if you ever feel yourself or Henry to be in danger and you can’t find me, go to the garden. There aren’t many places that are truly mine in this castle, but that one is. His has sworn an oath never to enter.”

“And if he breaks it?”

Regina shook her head. “The Dark One’s word is his bond, Emma. If he broke a single oath it would rock the foundations of every other vow he’s ever sworn. The Dark One deals in promises. His power, his life force itself, relies on them. He wouldn’t risk that, no matter how much pleasure he gets in giving you a hard time.”

Emma scanned the corners of the room, as if to make sure he wasn’t still there.

“The Dark One can hear most of what’s said in this castle if he wants to. At least when he’s inside it. I wouldn’t let it bother you. I don’t. He can think what his twisted little lizard brain likes and I’ll conduct my business as usual. Though if you’re afraid of him eavesdropping, you could just write it down instead. You can write, can’t you?”

“I’m broke, not illiterate.”

Regina couldn’t resist the wide smirk that spread across her face. “Miss Swan, I do believe that’s the first genuinely funny thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

Emma’s skin flushed pink all the way to the tips of her ears, though she said. “You’ve been keeping track, have you?”

“Of the number of times you’ve made me question my assumption of your low wit and nonexistent sense of humor? Well, yes.”

Emma gaped at her. “My sense of humor? Regina, I’m pretty sure you skewer me with a pitchfork in your mind every time you look at me.”

“And I’ll do so much less now that I know you’re capable of being funny.”

“I can count on one hand how many times I’ve seen you smile——I mean really smile, not that dumb smirk of yours——and that’s only ever been for Henry. And don’t think I haven’t noticed that little budding relationship either.”

“I can’t help it that he’s not scared of me like he should be.”

“Should he?”

“I just mean that anyone with good sense would encourage a healthy dose of fear in their son for the neighborhood witch.”

“Lucky for you, I’ve never had good sense.”

“On that we can agree, Miss Swan,” Regina murmured, feeling an unfamiliar warmth flush all the way down to the collar of her dress. “On that we can agree.”

((()))

Emma’s skin prickled all the way up to her room.

A bubble of hysteria blocked her chest. Her mind went over and over the silly cant in Regina’s voice. The playful but gentle way she’d had of teasing, and the way it had worked so effectively to get her mind off the Dark One. She wondered if Regina had done that on purpose, or if they’d both just fallen into it.

They’d teetered on the edge of that sort of playful banter before. But all their previous interactions had never been completely sapped of hostility.

In her pocket was the weight of an iron key. It swung back and forth in the light fabric of her pajama trousers. It was identical to the one with which Regina had opened the garden door. She’d kept her word. She’d replicated her key before Emma left the kitchen. The insistence, the protectiveness in the undercurrent of her voice, had warmed Emma in a way that made her uncomfortable and giddy. She’d heard that tone before in Red and Granny, but neither of them made her chest gurgle with this strange hysteria that she carried with her back to bed.

She wanted to go down to the kitchen and let Regina make her laugh some more. She liked how they could rile each other up, that Regina could match her quip for quip. She liked being reminded what it felt like to laugh like they shared a secret, even though no secrets had been told, nothing said or confirmed aloud. It was harmless and silly. It was fun.

Flirting at midnight with a witch over tea was the last place she’d have ever expected to find herself. Somehow, an even more unlikely scenario than getting pregnant, or watching Bael walk away, or stumbling out of a storm into the first home she’d ever known.

She’d never questioned those other things. She’d let the currents take her. You couldn’t control this life. She hadn’t even been able to die successfully, and that should have required no effort at all. Should’ve just been able to waste away to dust.

So if the universe was granting her one night to feel giddy like a girl again, almost like she had in those early days with Bael, then that was a gift and she wouldn’t refuse.

The tips of her fingers were ice cold, but her chest and face were flushed, as she creaked open the door to the chambers she shared with Henry. It was more like an entire apartment. There was an entryway and sitting room, and study and bedroom, all connected by a single walkway. She lit a candle and observed every corner of each room, just to be sure they had no unwelcome nighttime visitors. With the Dark One in the castle, she couldn’t help the creeping sense of unease that crawled up the back of her neck as she peered into the shadows. Regina had promised the garden was off limits, but hadn’t said anything about the bedroom.

Henry was sleeping soundly, bundled in the blankets as Emma had left him. The sheets on her side of the bed were still slightly damp with sweat from her nightmare. Her questions hadn’t really been answered. The Dark One hadn’t confirmed if he’d been purposefully disturbing her dreams or not. Emma suspected that his opaqueness was intentional, meant to increase her discomfort. Not knowing was worse than anything.

She shuffled Henry to the middle of the bed so she could have a dry space to sleep. He snuffled and curled in her direction, waking blearily for a moment. She shushed him and tucked the blankets under his chin. Being affectionate was easier in the dark when they were both half-asleep.

He blinked as if to orient himself. She was afraid he would wake up. She was tired now and wanted to sink into the downy mattress. But as soon as he saw her he hummed and his eyes closed. Like just her presence was enough to reassure him that everything was alright, wherever they were it was safe, he didn’t need to know the details because she would take care of everything. He didn’t need to worry. All he needed to do was trust her.

It went without saying that she didn’t deserve a trust like that. She’d walked him right into the dragon’s lair. She’d told him he was safe while a lizard man stalked the halls and a witch played games with mens’ hearts.

An oath wouldn’t keep the Dark One away from her dreams or out of their bed. She cast fervid glances around the room, inspecting every shadow cast by the moon and trees that tapped upon the windowpane. She felt the circles dip under her eyes. She’d felt so sure after her conversation with Regina. Resigned but willing to take whatever pleasure the universe saw fit to dole out. But that didn’t take Henry into account. Henry deserved more than resignation and fate’s fancies. He still had a chance. He deserved the best one she could give him.

She got into bed and covered herself. She wondered where Red was, what Granny was doing at that moment.

Once, when she was still grieving Bael, Red had said to her, “You don’t need a man. You don’t need a woman either. You are strong enough to make it alone.”

Red didn’t understand. Red had always had family. People who believed in her value and taught her her worth.

Emma didn’t have people. Bael had been her people. Granny and Red were her people but Granny was getting on and Red didn’t want to run the tavern forever. And Henry——she’d been losing Henry since the day he was born, first by choice, and then later through no fault of her own. Sometimes she felt like the universe was sending her a message; _you were right, Emma Swan. Henry was a mistake that never should have happened. We are taking care of it for you._

((()))

When Red awoke, flames crackled by her side. She yipped in panic and scrambled back, but the thorny barrier that had provided her shelter now impeded her escape.

The fire didn’t expand into her grove of thorns. When Red peered close, she realized it was contained by a dry patch of dirt where snow had been cleared away.

A cloaked figure huddled on the other side of the fire, covered in a fine layer of snowflakes. Red resisted the snarl in her throat and lunged into a more defensive position, even though she knew how wolfish the posture made her look.

The figure showed her hands, clad in fur-lined gloves. “Don’t be scared,” it said, higher and more feminine than Red had expected. The woman slowly lifted her hand to her hood, as if not to startle a wary animal, and pulled it down. Black hair tumbled forth.

It was the female guard from the border. Dread coiled in Red’s stomach.

“Are you following me?”

The woman said, “You lied during your examination.”

“I didn’t.”

“It’s no use to keep lying. If nothing else, at the moment your eyes are giving it away. You’re a shape-shifter.”

In her defensiveness, Red’s facial features had begun to transform into those of a wolf. Her eyes were slitted, narrow and yellow. She felt around with her tongue and realized fangs jutted from the top of her mouth.

She immediately shifted into more human features, but of course it was too late.

“How did you know?” she whispered, pulling her cloak around her.

“That you were lying? I have a sense for that sort of thing. But you had no weapons or stolen goods on you. So why else would you lie about who you are? Your face didn’t match any of the fugitives we’d been told to look for. That left only the one option.”

“Why didn’t you stop me, then? At the border.”

The woman pursed her lips and didn’t reply, but Red already knew.

If Mulan had exposed her at the border, Red would’ve been imprisoned if she was lucky; summarily executed without trial if she was not. Humans did not extend mercy or justice to her kind.

“Then why did you follow me, if you were going to let me go?”

“It would’ve either been me or the border patrol.”

Red shivered and her gaze flickered to the fire. Mulan smiled kindly and it didn’t seem like a trick, so Red adjusted her cloak to provide a mat on top of the snow, and huddled close to the flames. She longed for her wolf form, the thick fur coat that thrived in freezing temperatures.

“Not many shifters even attempt the crossing anymore,” Mulan said. “You don’t seem like an enemy combatant, and frankly you’re a terrible liar. I thought maybe…you had a good reason.”

“Because we’re only allowed to live if we have good reasons, right?”

Mulan winced. Red immediately wished she could cut out her tongue. Granny had always said that her mouth was going to get her into trouble one day.

Antagonizing a patrolwoman on the wrong side of the border was probably something Granny would classify as trouble.

“What are you going to do?” she asked. If Mulan had wanted to expose or arrest her, she’d had plenty of opportunities.

“Well,” Mulan said. “It’s like I said. You’re obviously not a smuggler or a soldier.”

“Should I be insulted?”

“And I suppose you could be planning a solo killing spree but honestly seems unlikely. Had any relatives taken by border patrol?”

“You mean shot down for target practice? Yeah, had a few. Everybody knows somebody, over there.”

Mulan bit her lip. “Looking for revenge?”

“Who’d I take revenge on exactly? The whole damn country?”

“Well,” Mulan said, and Red hated how reasonable and calm she sounded. “They say the princess was stolen as retaliation against the crown. You could be coming for the prince next.”

The queen of the Enchanted Forest had given birth late in life to a second child. He was considered the country’s salvation——an heir born at last, and a replacement for the lost daughter.

Mulan gave her a look that said she better start talking.

Red told her about Henry.

When she was done, Mulan was silent for a while, mulling it over, and her expression was so thoughtful that Red began to feel hope.

“OK,” Mulan said at last. “I don’t think you’re lying.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

Mulan glared. “Listen, you’re the one who crossed the wall illegally. I have a right to be suspicious.”

“Do you know why that wall is even there?”

“Look,” Mulan said. “I know you’re not all the same, obviously, but there was a military contingent that marched into the Enchanted Forest. The queen is just trying to protect——”

“The queen is trying to protect her assets,” Red sneered. “Her grandfather built that wall because my people were getting rich selling our resources to the Enchanted Forest, and he needed a way to tax goods coming into the country. Except we were the ones who had to pay the tax, to have the privilege of doing trade in his Majesty’s territory. Except now we’re not even allowed to set foot over the borderline and your royals buy our goods for dirt cheap, then turn around and sell for ten times more, and do we ever see a penny of it?”

“Don’t sell to them then,” Mulan said quietly.

“Who else are we supposed to sell too? We’re a country of paupers. Your king made sure of that.”

“I didn’t know,” said Mulan.

“They made sure of that too.”

“I’m sorry.”

Red waved her away. “Tell that to the rotting corpses at the border.”

They sat in silence, Mulan with her chin rested on her knees, staring at the fire. She brushed her eyelash the way one would wipe away a tear. Red wondered if she’d made her cry and only felt a little sorry.

Finally, Mulan said, “Here’s what we’re going to do. I’ll escort you to the capitol and help you find this wizard. Then I’ll escort you back and see you over the border. That way I can confirm for myself that you return. So if anyone ever asks I can speak truthfully that you’re no longer in the country.”

“And if this is just a trick to turn me in at the capitol?”

“I watched you sleep for an hour. I could have sedated or incapacitated you at any time and dragged you back to my superior officer.”

“Good point.”

“Besides, I don’t want your boy to die. I’m not a monster.”

“He’s not my boy.”

“You know what I mean.”

Red shivered and rubbed her eyes. “Alright. Fine. Deal. Do you have more wood for the fire?”

Mulan smiled and retrieved dry logs from a sack she carried.

Red didn’t sleep for the rest of the night, just in case there were any tricks, but at dawn the snow eased and Mulan emerged from the bundle of her cloak, rubbing her face blearily. “You’re still here?” she said.

“Where else would I be?”

“I just thought…”

Red realized that by falling asleep Mulan had intentionally given her an out. But she was tired and cold and as long as she had eyes on Mulan, that meant she couldn’t be somewhere else, raising the alarm.

“Anything in that bag that passes for breakfast?”

“You didn’t bring any food?”

She shrugged. She was an excellent hunter even in human form. “Didn’t expect it to snow so soon. Thought I would scavenge.”

“The weather’s been weirder than usual, lately.”

Mulan shared her loaf of bread and a couple slices of jerky.

Red turned the bread over in her hand. “I thought you were in the middle of a famine.”

Mulan flushed. “What there is, the army gets the best of it. Lots of people joined for that.”

“Is that why you enlisted?”

Mulan avoided her eyes. “Sort of. I send money back to my family.”

“But that’s not why.”

“…I thought I was doing something honorable. I was so proud when they moved me to the border, the frontlines.”

“The frontlines of what? Genocide?”

“I didn’t know.”

“That’s not a good enough excuse.”

“You’re right.”

Mulan’s tired eyes deflated Red’s anger, and she let it go. It couldn’t hurt to have an imperial soldier on her side when she tried to infiltrate the capitol. Granny would tell her to be smart, keep her mouth shut, don’t push so hard. She took a deep breath and remembered the reason she was doing this.

She thought of Henry laughing. Emma and her rare smiles. Granny making smart, sly commentary from her chair by the fire, body frail but mind sharp as ever.

Whatever she had to do, whoever she had to appease. She had to get home to them.


	9. Chapter Nine

A few nights later, Regina waited until all the servants had gone to bed and crept down in her robe to the kitchen She put the kettle on and opened a novel at the table. She didn’t read novels often anymore but reading to Henry had stirred an old affection for them. She’d bypassed her shelves, full of books on magic theory, pedagogy, spell recipes and the like, all the things her days had been consumed with for the past decade.

She climbed the eastern tower to the attic that was kept for storage. There she found a box of books delivered from her father when she’d first arrived at the castle. She’d had a penchant for adventure stories as a child, but her father had tucked in an assortment of his own favorites too. She selected one and brought it down the kitchen, thinking Henry might like it. She hadn’t read him any more stories since the first time. He was too distracted by his newfound energy. He’d driven Emma to near madness this afternoon.

“What are you smiling about?”

Regina straightened her face.

Emmas expression was amused, knowing.

“You,” she said. “Trying to wrangle your son into the bath. Are you sure you don’t prefer him bedridden?”

“Ha ha.”

Emma said down across from Regina just as the kettle started to sing. “I’ll get it.” She sprung across the room before Regina was out of her seat.

“Chamomile?” Emma asked, knowing her way around the cabinets by now.

She set the cream and cup before Regina and returned to her own seat with the sugar.

“You’re as bad as Henry,” Regina said.

“Fortunately, unlike Henry, I’m in charge of my own sugar intake,” Emma said with a grin as she doled out four sugar cubes for herself and one for Regina.

“Thank you.” Regina put a marker in her book and set it aside. Emma pulled the volume towards herself.

“The Sky Ship,” she read.

Inside, the print was large and bold, and illustrations had been inked into the corners.

“Not your usual fare,” Emma said.

“No.”

“Is there like, a hidden incantation if you read it backwards, take every third letter, and then turn it upside down?” Emma grinned.

Regina rolled her eyes. “It’s a novel,” she said, snatching it back and stroking its spine fondly. “My father gave it to me for my tenth birthday.”

“Is it any good?”

“Not particularly.”

“Then why——”

“You ask a lot of questions, Miss Swan.”

Emma smiled. “I hear that a lot.”

Regina said, “It’s not exactly high literature, but my tenth year was hard. I lost someone in my life. Someone I didn’t consider important until they were gone.”

“Your father?”

Regina shook her head. “I lost him later,” she said. “Be warned, Miss Swan. My life is a trail of losses.”

“I never had anyone to lose,” Emma admitted, then glanced at the ceiling, where two floor above them Henry lay sleeping. “Until now.”

“For better or worse, my father was not a man of action. But he always had healing words. And he knew, when words didn’t suffice, the escapist power of stories.”

“What’s it about?”

“A swashbuckling heroine and her adventures.”

“What’s a sky ship?”

“Exactly what it sounds like. I thought——well, if he can stay still for a moment, Henry might enjoy it.”

“Are you kidding? He’d love it.”

Regina smiled down at the book.

“Are you done with your tea?” Emma asked.

Regina realized she had drained her cup. Emma stacked the china and carried it to the sink, where they would be washed in the morning with the breakfast dishes.

“Well,” she said. “That’s settled then.” She pushed the book into Emma’s hands.

“You don’t want to finish it?”

“I’ve read that book a hundred times. Besides, it’s for children. You might convince Henry to sit still for once.”

“Hey. I’d like to see you try for a change.”

((()))

It was the next night that Emma asked, “Who was it?”

“Who?”

“The person you lost.”

Regina studied her tea for such a long while that Emma thought her silence was the answer. Regina was always watching her. Gaging her reaction. As if it would finally occur to Emma that she was breaking bread with a woman who had committed terrible sins without remorse and would continue to do so. But Emma had made her peace with that from the beginning. What she couldn’t reconcile was the woman who tore out men’s hearts with the one who showed Henry where to find fairy-flies in the garden.

And then Regina began to speak. She told her the story of an unwilling bride and a lost princess and all the years and year spent searching for her. As if Regina herself was somehow responsible, her disdain and resentment the rotating cog that had set the fates in motion. The lines of regret on her face were deep and old and sad, and Emma wanted to say, _but you were just a child_, which was what Red would sometimes say to Emma herself, even though it meant nothing and didn’t matter, because in the end everyone else was dead or stolen or lost, and it was just you, alone, who had to find a way to live with it.

When the story was over, Regina cleared her throat and dabbed her mouth with a napkin, an excuse to wipe the silent tears that had proliferated in the curve of her upper lip. Emma tried to imagine that woman as a queen instead of a witch, but in her vision of Regina on a throne, not much had actually changed. Her eyes still had that slitted, cat-like look. Regina with sovereignty at her fingertips instead of magic.

“I could see you as queen,” she said quietly.

Regina smiled without amusement. “So my mother says.”

“You didn’t want it?”

“I was a child. I wanted to ride my horses and hunt with my father. I knew one day I would inherit his lands and I had a strong sense of duty to him. He was a benevolent man but he held no sway over my mother, despite the fact that he’d lowered himself to marry her. She’d clawed herself up from the rank of squire’s daughter and charmed him with her beauty and slick words.

“But it wasn’t enough for her. She wanted the realm, not some minor ladyship on the edge of the kingdom, in the shadow of an empty mountain range. And if she couldn’t have it for herself, then she would have it for me.”

Red had once said to Emma that a cornered wolf will not cower. And a kicked dog will never forget. She wasn’t sure which one Regina was.

((()))

Regina wasn’t in the kitchen the next night.

Emma boiled water and set the tea leaves but no one came.

She lost her appetite and poured the contents of the kettle down the sink.

((()))

She pouted the next morning, and knew that Regina noticed, because she invited Henry to the garden and said, “Get a hold of yourself, Miss Swan. You’re upsetting Henry.”

“I’m fine.”

“I’ll see you tonight.”

Emma looked up.

“I’d rather not share my evening with a pouting child, though. Go snap out of it. I’ll watch Henry.”

((()))

Emma crossed her arms sheepishly as she entered. Regina was already in the kitchen and the smell of chocolate filled the air.

“I thought, perhaps, a change of pace,” Regina said.

She was smiling, so Emma was comforted.

And easily distracted by chocolate.

“Where’d you get this?” she gasped when she investigated the stove.

A hard lump of chocolate melted in a pot. Regina had a secret smile on her face as she poured in milk and sugar.

“More,” Emma said, eyes alight. “Or it’ll be bitter.”

“Some of us aren’t sugar fiends,” Regina said. She added another spoonful, though.

“Can we make some for Henry, too?”

Regina’s face softened. “Of course.”

Emma smirked. “Kid’s got you wrapped around his finger, huh?”

“I have no idea what you’re referring to.”

“It’s alright. He’s got that effect on people.” Emma shrugged and hopped up on the table. “He’s happy, ya know? Not a lot of that to spare, around here.”

“Here?” Regina looked around her kitchen.

“You know what I mean. Everywhere.” Emma waved her arms to encompass the castle and the village and the mountains and the sky, and maybe the Enchanted Forest, too.

Regina left the chocolate to stew and sat at the table next to Emma. “Actually,” she said wryly. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Emma smacked her head. “That’s right. You can’t leave. You don’t have any crystal balls or anything?”

Regina chuckled. “No crystal balls.”

“Magic pools? Mirrors?”

Regina pursed her lips.

Emma snapped her fingers. “Mirrors.”

Regina was too late in concealing her surprise.

“It’s alright, I already knew.” Emma swung her feet back and forth.

“Excuse me?”

“There are like, three of them in your study.”

“They’re covered up!”

Emma giggled. “What else could they be? Also, Henry accidentally pulled the sheet off one of them once.”

“That’s it. I take it back. I have no soft spot for him whatsoever.”

Emma laughed. “Liar.”

Regina shook her head and smiled. They stared at each other.

They almost burned the chocolate.

((()))

Red had never seen a place so vast. She and Mulan stood at the end of a tributary that merged into the wide Four-Keys River. The river ran through a valley. In the distance, on the edge of a cliff, stood the palace, looming over the landscape, its spires made of delicate laced marble. The intricacy of it took her breath away.

“You OK?” asked Mulan.

Red swallowed. “Great.”

“Just stick by me,” Mulan said. Her sword swung from her hip. Chain mail ran down her back, and a short cape bore the emblem of Queen Snow, a white dragon coiled around the rising sun. Her cloak had been packed away as soon as they entered warmer territory. The queen’s southern homeland still had the marks of late summer. Things were almost growing. A few fields they passed cultivated wheat and corn. It was limp and dry but even Mulan seemed surprised at seeing so much. “They fared better than I thought they would.”

Red’s stomach was hollow, but she didn’t dare steal food in sovereign land. Mulan’s rations tided them over.

They climbed the cliffs.

“They’re strict at the gates,” Mulan said. “I know a side entrance.”

It wasn’t technically an entrance, but a weak section of the wall where they could climb over crumbling stone.

“You realize shape-shifters get shot for doing this at the border, right?”

Mulan bit her lip. “I see the juxtaposition, yes.”

They grunted as they heaved themselves over the lip of the unguarded strip of battlements.

They landed in a heap of rubbish. Red shuddered as she picked scraps of garbage off her body. They stood in a small alleyway that ran towards a populated square, where vendors hawked street food and wine and handmade jewelry. Fluttering from roofs and street-lamps were flags with the queen’s signet.

Mulan had donned her cloak again. “Less ostentatious,” she said. “Hungry?”

Red was starved, but restless. The smell of cooked meats was suddenly oppressive instead of appealing. “I just want to do what I came to do.”

Mulan frowned. “My rations were only meant to last one person a week. We stretched them three weeks between the two of us.”

“We can find something outside the city once we’re done here.” Red lingered in the shadows of the alley.

Understanding dawned on Mulan’s face. She shook her head. “It’s a long journey back to the border. You need to keep your energy up. Stay here.”

Red pressed her head to the cool stone wall and tempered her heartbeat. Hunger fought with unease in her stomach. But when Mulan returned with meat pies she wasted no time in devouring them. They weren’t anywhere near as thick with gravy and meat as the ones Granny made, but they soothed the raw emptiness in her belly.

A small smile crossed Mulan’s face. “What did I tell you,” she murmured.

“Don’t be smug,” Red garbled through a mouthful. She looked down at her empty hands. “Were we supposed to share those?”

Mulan shrugged. “I ate one walking over.”

Red narrowed her eyes.

Mulan smiled again. “Come, then. We have a wizard to find.”

When Red didn’t move, Mulan cocked her head.

“I don’t exactly…know where I’m going,” Red said.

“You came all this way without a plan? Any contacts?”

“I didn’t think I’d even make it over the border, to be honest,” Red admitted.

“Well.” Mulan shifted from side to side. “I can get us to the wizarding district, but they’re a shifty lot. If you don’t already have a contact, it might not be easy catching their interest.”

“That won’t be a problem.”

“Red…these are Enchanted Forest wizards. They’re pragmatic. They don’t like being ordered around and they’re not going to drop everything for a sick boy a realm away.”

“I’ve got it handled.”

When Mulan still looked doubtful, Red took a deep breath and played her gambit. She gestured Mulan to come close, and they stood together out of sight of the square. Mulan’s expression was curious but cautious. Red reached into her robes and produced the heavy sack that Emma had given her. She untied the string and allowed Mulan a look inside, just long enough to see and understand its contents.

Mulan nearly choked at the sight of all that gold. “Where did you…? Red, did you…?”

“It’s not stolen, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Red hissed.

Mulan blushed. “No, I didn’t——”

“Yes, you did. How else could a poor Garmir peasant have gotten their hands on so much money?”

“Red——”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about that. The boy’s mother earned it all. She’s a bounty hunter. It’s good work that pays well. This amounts to her life savings. Look, Mulan, she and I have risked our lives to see this through and I’m not going home empty-headed, whether you help me or not.”

“Of course I’m going to help you,” Mulan insisted. “Red, I…”

“You didn’t know,” Red sneered. “So you’ve said.”

Mulan looked on the verge of tears, a strange sight on her normally stoic face.

Red wondered when her features had started to seem so familiar.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

Mulan’s eyes widened.

“Don’t make it a thing,” Red muttered. “Can you still get me to the wizarding district?”

Mulan nodded. Before they set off she caught Red’s sleeve. “Red, I…I want to see this through. For you, for that little boy. I’m in this, now.”

Resolve set the other woman’s face. Red studied her eyes, the firm jut of her chin. “There’s no going back,” she warned.

“I know.” Mulan was steady and sure. She nodded to Red and offered her hand. Red gripped it and they shook, and it was finished, like a pact had been sealed.

And automatically Red could breathe easier. Paranoia had gripped her chest since the moment in the woods when she’d agreed to Mulan’s proposal. She’d hadn’t had a choice; she’d been at the whim of an enemy soldier’s fickle loyalty. But there was a reassurance in Mulan’s gaze that hadn’t been there before. A decision that had been made.

Red let herself be led into the sunshine of the marketplace. She held her breath, muscles clenched as she prepared to flee. But not a single person so much as glanced their way. They entered the cascade of the crowd and slipped through like two fish following the currents of a river. Mulan navigated the square with ease and all Red had to do was follow in her footsteps.

She hissed the first time a man jarred her from the side. He held up his hands, “Relax, woman,” but was already striding off in the opposite direction before Red could respond. He hadn’t really even looked at her face. She was just another body, she realized.

After that, the tension in her shoulders eased, though she remained ever on high alert.

Mulan’s cloak fluttered in the swirl of dust and human feet that passed over the cobblestone. They ventured past a fruit stall. The fruit was small and spotted, some berries shriveling in the sun. Mulan followed her gaze and stopped to purchase an apple for them each.

“You didn’t have to—” Red began.

“I know.” Mulan bit into her apple and grimaced. “Don’t thank me yet.”

The apple was bitter and soft, but it was still the sweetest thing Red had tasted in over three weeks. Her tried to remember her last supper at Granny’s.

She hated to think of all that time already gone. It would probably have taken even longer to reach the capitol if Mulan hadn’t been there to guide her. Henry didn’t have that kind of time.

Something was deeply wrong with him; she’d sensed it from the first. Wolves could smell sickness deep in the body. And this was no disease she had ever encountered. This was magic, dark magic, corrupting Henry’s blood.

“Let’s go,” she said.

Mulan nodded and tossed away her apple core. Red sucked every drop of juice from hers and did the same.

((()))

Regina had a firefly perched on her finger. Her head was tilted as she pretended to understand what it was saying and then translated for Henry, who hung off her arm in delight. His complexion was almost as dark as Regina’s from all his time lately spent in the sun.

Soon the shy creature became bold enough to climb from Regina’s hand to Henry’s. He babbled to her and she chittered back as she settled herself in his palm.

Regina sat down in the grass with Emma and they watched from afar. Regina took a girlish position, knees drawn to her chest as she pulled apart a blade of grass. Emma leaned back on her hands. Regina had given up on her long and heavy skirts today, but was still the picture of elegance and poise in a flowing purple sun-dress that had a wide, looping collar. It didn’t show as much of her cleavage as usual, although her collarbones were laid bare to the sun. In the garden it was always summer. Emma understood. The outside world couldn’t enter here.

Regina slipped off her shoes to join Emma barefoot. Emma’s eyes traced the long, slender soles. Her toenails were painted a blue so dark as to be almost black.

Regina plucked another stalk of grass.

“Here,” Emma said, taking it out of Regina’s hand. She folded and held it to her mouth, pursing her lips to create a trumpeting noise.

Regina laughed. “You are a child.” But her eyes were creased in a real smile. Those had been appearing more often these days, and Emma enjoyed discovering what drew them out.

“You makin grass music, Mama?” Henry ran over with the fairyfly on his shoulder and sat with crossed legs before Emma. He drew his own piece of grass and tried to copy his mother, drawing more laughter from Regina, who gathered him up and tickled his sides. The fairyfly chirped indignantly at being jostled and flew away, joined after a moment by a flock of her brethren. Emma and Regina and Henry watched them soar against the backdrop of a lazy afternoon sun.

Henry dozed.

“Have you ever had children?” Emma asked softly, watching Regina cradle him in her lap.

Regina looked at her in surprise.

Emma blushed. “I just…I mean…” She gestured to the two of them.

“No, Miss Swan,” Regina murmured. “No children for me.”

Emma laid on her stomach and held her chin in her hands. “Ever been in love?”

Regina snorted.

“What?”

Regina looked meaningfully around the garden. “Who is there for me to fall in love with?”

Their eyes met for a just a second. There was a whoosh in Emma’s stomach and she looked away.

“I mean…before.”

“Before what, exactly?”

“You know.”

“Before my mother sold me, you mean?”

Emma winced and stared at the remnants of their grass trumpets, now torn up and scattered on the ground. “Forget it.” She rolled on her back and let the sun warm her face. Henry stirred; Regina hummed to him.

“I was supposed to fall in love,” Regina said after a while.

Emma tilted her head; Regina was watching her. Her gaze was gentler now. Her moods gave Emma whiplash, sometimes.

“I was betrothed, once. We were children. My parents hoped I’d grow to love her.”

“Her?”

“A princess, if you can believe it.” Regina smiled grimly. “Can you imagine me, queen?”

“Yes,” Emma said simply.

Regina frowned. “I never wanted to be queen.”

“You’d rather be a sorceress?”

“I’d rather be nothing at all.”

“Regina!”

Purple flames licked up Regina’s forearms, nearly grazing the top of Henry’s hair. Regina squawked and extinguished them at once. She set Henry on the ground, and the jostling awoke him. He whined a little bit and looked around for his mother. Emma held out her arms and he crawled to her, surprised but unharmed.

“I’m sorry,” Regina whispered.

“It’s fine, Regina,” Emma said.

“But I didn’t…” Regina stared down at her hands in disgust.

“It was an accident. He’s safe. Look.”

Without thinking she drew her hand beneath Regina’s chin. Regina shivered at her touch, features still consumed by horror, but let Emma guide her to examine the perfectly unscathed child in her arms.

Emma kept her fingers there too long. Regina’s skin was soft and smooth, the column of her throat slender and warmed by the sun. Emma’s eyes were drawn to the curve of Regina’s collarbone.

Regina flinched.

Emma pulled back and coughed. “What——what happened?”

Regina opened and closed her fists in a rhythmic motion. “Young witches lose control. But I am not young and I should know better. Restraint is the first lesson we are taught. I apologize.”

“Regina…” Emma didn’t like the formality in her tone. It made her distant again, when a moment ago they’d been laughing together.

“I’m sorry.” Regina looked away.

“Regina.”

Emma set Henry down in the grass and rose to her knees, sitting so that their legs nearly touched. Regina’s kneecaps flinched. Emma gathered up her hands. Regina tried to pull away but she tightened her grip. “Hey.” Emma ducked her head, trying to meet her eyes. “Talk to me?”

Regina drew a shaky breath. Emma kept a firm grasp on her hands. If Regina’s feelings went out of control again, she’d be there to steady the flames. And she sensed, in that moment, that Regina desperately needed someone to steady her. “I’m sorry I brought up bad memories.”

Regina shook her head. “No. It’s not your fault.”

“It kind of is.” Emma smiled.

Regina bit her lip.

“Emma. Please. Let go.”

Emma shook her head and settled in. “Tell me,” she said.

“I don’t want to.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Regina jerked her hands from Emma’s grasp and jumped to her feet. She brushed the grass stains off her dress, which suddenly seemed too light and airy to match her dark expression. This was the witch again. In her eyes brewed a storm of fire.

“Regina…” Emma stood up to follow her but Regina said a few words and spun a wall of light between them. Emma tried to touch it and gasped when it stung her skin. It died and fizzled after a few minutes but by that time, Regina was gone.

Emma swore in frustration. Henry talked to himself, still asleep. It was his nap time. She wouldn’t have been able to stay much longer in the garden with Regina anyway.

((()))

The price she offered was enough to make a small man rich. Red had expected that the sight of shimmering gold would allure a sorcerer to their cause in the span of an afternoon. Mulan warned her not to hope so high. The capitol wizards were a stingy lot and they knew that only trouble would await them in Garmir. Better to stay safe in their enclave and profit from the locals, hoping to attract the attention of a noble lord or lady who might sign on as their patron, and they could live out their days in a manor kept fat and content performing parlor tricks for guests and children. A talented witch or wizard was a coveted commodity among the nobility.

The first man shook his head when they ventured to ask if he’d be willing to travel for work. He had children and a shop to maintain. A journey so far north was long and dangerous.

Red and Mulan refrained from divulging that they wouldn’t just be traveling to the border, but crossing it.

The first man was apologetic. “I’m sorry I can’t do much for the boy. But I have some potions you might be interested in, to ease his suffering.

Red could see in his eyes that he didn’t like the sound of Henry’s chances.

The next man was less sympathetic, and he curtly declined to so much as peer into Red’s sack. But as they left she saw him eying it, and was grateful for Mulan, blade at her hip and wearing the queen’s colors.

The bell at the top of the door jingled as they exited the fourth location. These were shops and offices where witches and wizards advertised their services and sold wares. They made the traveling witches that passed through town sometimes back home look like hacks.

Along with her Majesty’s officers, wizards were another ilk that suffered least in the face of limited food stores and rationed water. They were revered. They always thrived wherever they were.

A creeping dejection grew in Red. For the first time she started to doubt the sensibility of her expectations. At home, their plan had seemed like the only solution that held a hope for Henry, but now it felt like she was just wasting time. Another fear gripped her, the one she’d kept buried, that said she was too late. She could’ve been at Henry’s bedside now, reading to him and cuddling him and whispering all the words of love she knew, so that if these really were his last days he’d spend them wrapped in the arms of the ones who loved him.

Instead she’d abandoned him.

She wondered if maybe that was the point.

If she’d left so that she wouldn’t have to watch him die.

Unable to bear the dusty, wide open streets, the bursting colors and stench of magic, she slipped into an alley and leaned her temple against the cool clay brick. She tried to remember how to breathe. She was afraid she’d start crying in front of Mulan.

Mulan who’d followed her and stood at her side, blocking Red’s body from curious passerby.

Anger welled in her then, a welcome balm to fear and grief. She didn’t need this woman’s pity or protection.

Before she could snap at her, Mulan said, “You noticed it too.”

Mulan wasn’t looking at her, hadn’t seemed to notice that she was on the verge of tears. She faced the street, her eyes narrowed as she scanned the market. Red followed her gaze but didn’t see anything.

“Notice what?” she asked.

Mulan frowned. “You didn’t? Maybe I’m just being paranoid.”

“Notice what, Mulan?”

“I think we’re being followed.”

Red groaned. “Do you think it’s that last guy? He was way too interested in my bag.”

Mulan blushed. “Uh, I don’t think it was your bag he had his eyes on.”

Red’s eyebrows shot up. She almost laughed. She should have known.

“I’m sorry——” Mulan stammered, face flushed. “I didn’t——”

“It’s alright,” Red giggled. “I’m a barmaid. I’m used to it.”

Mulan looked like she had not a clue what to do with this new information; in three weeks of travel they hadn’t exactly had many heart to hearts. They’d kept to themselves on opposite sides of the fire, shivering each alone.

“I don’t think it’s him,” Mulan said at last. “It’s more than one…they’re coming from different directions.”

“How do you know?”

“We’re trained to sense that sort of thing. Look, we need to get out of this alley, we’re too closed off.”

The alley was a dead-end; if they were cornered they’d have nowhere to go.

“What’s the plan?”

“Keep to the edges of the road. Maybe we can disappear down a side street. Follow me. Stay alert.”

Red nodded and together they emerged from the dimness of the alley. She squinted; the sun shone on street performers weaving colors creatures from spools of magical light. Several street stalls hawked cheap potions, ingredients and used spell-books. The market occupied a wide road that extended nearly the entire length of the city’s western wall. It would be impossible to avoid their stalkers if they stayed on the main road.

After a few steps, Red could tell what Mulan was talking about. She sensed it. The same faces popping up again, moving too casually in their direction, weaving away through the crowds before wandering back again.

Red’s body tensed, and she longed for her wolf form. She was safer as a wolf. Had stronger defenses, faster instincts.

Mulan slowed her pace so they were walking side by side. “See that street up ahead?”

Red tipped her head just slightly.

“Yeah, that one. There’s a tavern on the right with a back door. The streets beyond are confusing. You’ll have to keep up.”

“I can keep up.”

Things happened quickly, then.

They pivoted. The street Mulan had indicated seemed open ahead of them, and Red felt a burst of relief.

Then figures in black dropped down from somewhere above them——the roofs, a window? There was no time to change course before they were surrounded. Mulan froze. She cursed.

“Black-cloaks. The queen’s private guard…You have to run, Red. I’ll distract them.”

“Mulan, no—”

“Go!”

It didn’t matter. Red turned and fled but there were more of them waiting. She hunched her shoulders and growled in a way that was no quite human. It made the men pause for a second. The crowd around them cleared. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled, but she resisted, standing so close to Mulan that she could smell her sweat and fear. There came the zing of metal as mulan unsheathed her longsword. Her heel bumped Red’s as she braced her feet in a fighting form.

Red snarled.

“Red, no.”

One of the men in black stepped forward. “Don’t bother. Lay down your sword.”

Mulan didn’t move, Red could tell.

“And you,” he said to Red. “Don’t try to change form.”

Red, who was beginning to feel hairs lengthen down her spine, immediately snapped back into a more human position.

For the first time, she was afraid. She hadn’t been, but that was before this man had come forward and identified her secret with such conviction. She didn’t understand how he’d known. Always before, her wolf had been a closely kept secret, a gift that belonged to her. A weapon that could not be used against her.

But the man’s eyes gleamed with knowing. He made a gesture to his comrades, barely perceptible.

Red caught it at once and swung her hand back, knocking it against Mulan’s in warning.

Then there was nothing else to lose. As the battalion of men in black leapt forward so did she, and her body transformed fluidly in midair——when she landed her teeth caught on the first man, who screamed as she bit into his flesh and flung him aside.

The next, the one who had addressed them, ducked. Her teeth grazed his sleeve but he spun out of her range and ended up back on his feet, facing her and clutching a spear the length of his body.

She evaded his first blow. The spear was fast but easy to dodge; she was faster. She lunged under it and swung towards his exposed torso, practically tasting the flesh before her mouth closed down around it. There was a rush of victory. A cry of triumph.

Before her jaws could snap closed, he dropped the spear and grabbed her by the scruff. Through the contact she felt something sharp injected into her neck. Bright, shattering pain—light. Pure magic. It rushed into her veins. Her heart stuttered, nearly stopped.

In the corner of her eye she saw a second figure fly at the man, screaming and lashing out with a brilliant silver blade. Mulan.

Red struggled to rise, to help her, to warn her. But her vision narrowed and blurred, her voice caught in her throat. She felt like she was shrinking.

She was shrinking. Her reddish-brown fur faded, replaced by pale flesh.

Human, helpless flesh.

With a sickening jolt her head smashed on the cobblestone and then there was nothing.


	10. Chapter Ten

Regina didn’t go down to the kitchen that night.

It was all Emma’s fault. Emma with laughter on her face but tragedy in her eyes, Emma who was unafraid of her and made her want to say things, admit things she hadn’t said aloud in years, or ever.

She vacated her study early, for fear that Emma would try to seek her out there. In her bed chambers, she slipped out of the sprightly dress she’d worn in the garden, and into a more restrictive muslin gown, suitable for dinner. It clutched at her curves, followed the lines of her body in black. She pinned her hair in a high bun, leaving loose several strands to fall about her face.

She felt contained again as she stared at herself in the mirror. The bodice of the dress was dark leather, framed by a lace heart-shaped collar that did generous things to her cleavage.

She looked like a witch again. In her palm she sparked a flame and extinguished it, letting magic burst in purple sparks around her body. She was in perfect control. Her flesh was rejuvenated by the warm rush of magic through her veins.

She summoned a servant and ordered supper be brought to her chambers. In her private sitting room she dined alone on thick carrot soup and pheasant. The taste fell to ashes in her mouth, though it was seasoned well and roasted.

She grew restless but couldn’t work, couldn’t focus. There came a knock at her door. She answered it, thinking it was a servant who’d come to collect the remains of her dinner.

It was Emma.

Of course it was Emma, who couldn’t let a thing lie.

“Why are you here?” Regina asked.

“You weren’t at dinner,” Emma said, stepping into the foyer before Regina could stop her.

“Yes, well, since you and Henry got here it’s been impossible to find a moment to myself.”

“You know I’d keep Henry out of the way if you’re busy——all you have to do is ask.”

Regina stepped out of her space, unable to stand so close when Emma was looking at her like that, thoughtful and too perceptive and not afraid to confront Regina in her own chambers.

“What do you want, Emma?”

“I want to know what happened today.”

“Regina scoffed. “Nothing happened today.”

“Then why won’t you look at me?”

“Forgive me for not welcoming you with open arms. Polite society doesn’t just barge into people living quarters without permission, you know.”

“Polite society? Are you kidding me? Regina, look who you’re talking to.”

“You live in my house, you don’t get to just do whatever you want. I’ve given you far too much leeway.”

“Don’t talk to me like I’m a fucking errand boy.”

They were equals. They had established that from the beginning.

“Then stop prying into my business.”

“You made it my business. What happened with Henry in the garden?”

“He’s fine, isn’t he?”

“Yes, he is. But you didn’t seem to think so.”

“Then you misread my feelings on the matter.”

“I don’t think I did. I think you lost control and you got scared.”

Surprise bolted through Regina, but she smoothed her features and said, “So if you have it all worked out, then why are you here?”

“Because I thought maybe you’d like someone to talk to. Sorry for wasting your time. I just wanted to help.”

“It would help if you left me alone. Stop trying to do me favors, Emma.”

“Oh, that’s right, because you’re the an irredeemable heartless witch. I don’t buy this whole act anymore, you know. I see the way you look at Henry. I see the way you look at me.”

“Whatever you’re imagining is there, Emma, I can tell you it’s not. Look, soon you will be done here and you will return to your life and I will be left alone, same as ever, and that is my lot in life. So if sometimes, yes, a happy child makes me smile for a moment, please allow me my indulgences.

She drew further into her chamber, but as soon as Emma followed, knew she should have known better than to think she could end this by walking away.

“You’re a liar,” Emma said into the dimness of the parlor.

“Excuse me?”

Emma’s voice shook. “You’re easier to read than you think. You’re not like the Dark One, cold and unfeeling and caring about nothing.”

“How do you presume to know what I am like? Emma, you have watched me rip hearts from the bodies of men.”

“Cruel men. Evil men. Men like the ones I know, the ones I grew up with. Why not children, why not your servants, why not beggar women you could pluck off the streets with no one the wiser?”

“If you’re trying to make yourself feel better about it, don’t bother. A life is a life. I am damned either way.”

“Then why do it at all?”

“Because! A price had to be paid. My soul for a kingdom. I’m the only witch powerful enough to make the magic work, and willing to pay the price.”

“What price, Regina, what are you talking about?”

Every iota of stubbornness in Regina withered then, as she stared at Emma’s pleading, desperate eyes, the crease of her temple as she tried to put the pieces together. Her resolve snapped like a frail bone. In a way, she’d damned Emma too, making her an unwitting part of this, the shadow of death that led men to their dooms. She hadn’t the power to redeem either of them, but at least she could tell her the truth.

“Sit down,” she said.

Emma didn’t move. A flicker of surprise crossed her face at the sudden weariness that infused Regina now that she had made her decision. And Emma was right about one thing; it was a relief to tell someone at last.

They sat on opposite sides of the sofa before the fire, and there she told the story of her mother, who cursed a kingdom so that her daughter might be queen. Until that moment, it had been a suspicion she hadn’t dared voice, but as the words escaped her, she knew they were true. She spoke of Rosemary, who’d been made a pawn before she even left the womb. Of what followed, Regina’s resentment and Rosemary’s disappearance. The Dark One’s wrath and Cora’s grudge against Snow for promising her a daughter that had already been sold to another.

“In the end, no one at all got what they wanted, except maybe the Dark One, though he’s never outright admitted to me that he was responsible.”

“And you,” Emma said.

“Hmm?”

“You didn’t have to marry the princess.”

Regina smiled, and gestured at the walls around them, her prison. “But I didn’t want this either. I sometimes think I could have grown fond of the princess if I’d been given more time. We were both pieces in a game we didn’t even know was being played. Perhaps we would have been allies against my mother.”

They sat silently in the parlor, crackling fire their only light; it sputtered as its fuel ran out, but neither of them got up to stoke it or throw on another log.

Emma shivered. “Can you say a heat spell or something?”

They were in the highest part of the castle, farthest from the warming hearths in the kitchen.

Regina’s lips quirked in a small smile. “There’s a pleasure in mundane ways of doing simple tasks, you know.” She went over to coax the flames back to life.

“There are empty villages from here all the way to Snow’s capitol,” she continued quietly when she took her seat again at Emma’s side. This time she didn’t press herself against the opposite arm of the sofa, but dared to decrease the distance between them. Emma was still there. Still willing to listen. That was more than Regina had ever dreamed, or would ever ask for.

“Where did they go?”

“Moved south mostly, to lands least affected by the drought. Or starved to death.”

Emma winced.

“So you see?”

“Not really.”

Regina sighed and smoothed the creases of her skirt. “You need life to beget life. And a beating human heart contains more magic than a whole host of wizards. In other parts of the world, what I am doing is forbidden. The laws are regulated within the wizarding communities. But the Dark One is the only one here and he doesn’t care what I do. Have you seen the white wildflowers in my study, on the windowsill?”

“Henry keeps saying he sees them glow, lately.”

“He probably has. Magic runs through them. Magic I gave them. When they’re planted, the spell I cast will travel through the ground, the vines and roots and seeds, bringing moisture back to the lands and richness to the soil. My mother’s curse is powerful for it to have lasted so long. The Dark One trained her too, you know. But I am stronger. I have spent too many years locked away with nothing to do but hone my magic. She has brought death, but that is easy. I have created life, and that is harder. The balance of the world is so fragile. The spell had to be able to meet that balance, to restore equilibrium.”

Emma covered her hand then. Regina flinched and looked down.

“This is why,” Emma said, picking up Regina’s hand and examining each finger in awe. The back of Regina’s neck prickled. She was confused. She wasn’t sure why Emma was touching her. What she had done to earn being touched like this. A caress.

“They will never thank me for it, I know,” she whispered. “I will never be hailed a hero. But this isn’t a story of redemption. Only setting back the balance.”

With her thumb, Emma followed the tendons on the back of Regina’s hand. Their skin was equally calloused, but Regina only felt softness and light. Emma’s touch was so much gentler than she expected, or deserved.

“You are…incredible,” Emma said.

“No,” Regina said. “I was just cursed with a responsibility no one wants, and powers others do not have.”

“Hey.” Emma tipped Regina’s chin so that their eyes might meet. “I’m sorry about…everything. I didn’t know.”

“You weren’t supposed to know. It was my burden to bear.”

Emma shook her head and smiled wryly. “You’re such a martyr, you know that?”

Regina stiffened. “No. I do not know that.”

Emma cuffed her cheek, and the fondness of the gesture made Regina want to cry. “You don’t have to do this alone, you know,” Emma said.

“I don’t want you mixed up in this anymore than you already are, Emma.”

“It’s a little late for that.”

“Think about Henry.”

“I am.”

“My mother is vindictive, Emma, haven’t you been listening? I’m trying to protect you. If she knows you’ve been involved…whether we succeed or fail. She won’t stop until she’s destroyed you.”

“So she won’t find out.”

Regina scoffed and rose to her feet, extracting her hand as she tried to put distance between them. Emma didn’t understand. Not when it came to Cora.

But Emma didn’t let her escape, and in a heartbeat they were beside each other. Regina rested her hands on the windowsill and stared out the glass plane, and in it she could see the reflection of the fluttering fire in the hearth.

Emma stood close, but did not quite touch. She didn’t have to. Regina was unnerved just by her presence there; people didn’t put themselves so close to someone like her, not on purpose. They knew what was good for them.

Emma was an idiot.

“You smell like roses,” is what she said.

“I took a bath,” said Emma.

Regina wanted to run. Her pulse pounded in her stomach. She couldn’t breathe. She felt the fabric at her waist give slightly.

“Did you use the rose-scented—”

“Yes.”

The night was distant and dark. A sliver of moon passed over the mountain peaks. Yellow lights glowed from the village down below.

A breath washed over the back of her neck. Not her own. Nothing like her own. Warm. Directed down her spine. She closed her eyes. Hands cupped her waist.

Then the featherlight touch of Emma’s temple resting on the crown of her head. Goosebumps prickled Regina’s arms and she wrapped them around her torso, although she was not cold. Their hands brushed, and the response was static. Giddiness bursting in her brain. Her chest felt like a thousand stars exploding, the same feeling as magic crackling through her veins. The static of those stars rushed through her and, finally, a response that Emma would notice: she quivered.

Tiny hairs sprang up on her skin.

Emma released her and sighed.

Regina whipped around and stared at her almost accusingly, for nearly crumbling her to pieces and then not making her over whole. She needed something. She didn’t know what. Or she did and didn’t want to admit it. She just wanted to need it, need and need and not think about it anymore tonight, or respond to the querying look in Emma’s eyes.

“Emma,” she said, and for once her voice wasn’t snappish or cold or tired. It was a pull. A question. 

((()))

Emma woke up in bed with Henry the next morning. The strange, tense moment with Regina from the night before was her first thought.

Nothing else had happened between them. But everything had happened. Emma understood now. For weeks there’d been a scale tipping and tipping back and forth in her head, unable to fall down on either side of what she felt about Regina. Was she a monster or just a lonely woman?

She’d been looking at it wrong. Regina wasn’t either of those things. She was haunted. Tortured by her own conscience. Doing the time for a crime that hadn’t been hers, sacrificing her own goodness to fix what her mother had done and save a land full of people who would never know her. Who, if they did, would see in her only the woman in black, the Dark One’s pupil, stealer of men’s hearts. A cruel, vengeful sorceress.

She felt the mattress for the lump that was Henry, and panic flared in her chest when she didn’t find him. She sprang up and looked around the room, but it was empty of her son. Then she noticed a piece of yellow parchment on his pillow and laughed when she saw, in shaky scrawling lines, RGEENA. They’d been working on his letters, now that he wasn’t trapped in a feverish delirium all the time. Emma had blanched at the idea of making him go to school at only three years old, but Regina had launched into a very long and boring speech about _the value of starting a child’s education early, and besides, it didn’t have to be in a formal capacity, only, Emma, you have to instill in him the love of learning before it’s too late…_

And so on until Emma laughed and covered her mouth to make her stop talking, and relented.

She folded the parchment and fit the note in her pocket, intending to show Regina.

She looked into the study but found them in the garden. They were both ruffled from the morning. Regina had carried up a blanket and a tray of breakfast; they were having a picnic.

Henry noticed her, shouted her name, and wave. “You come, Mama!” he shouted across the garden.

They became more distinct as Emma approached them. A coil of sickness tightened and tightened in her stomach at the sight of Regina, the presence of Regina, and as much as she dreaded it, she couldn’t stop wanting Regina to stay with them, and maybe look at her.

Emma reached them and sat on the blanket next to her son, who gave her the important task of slathering jam on a slice of toasted bread. She avoided Regina’s gaze and let Henry put her to work. He babbled orders, completely self-possessed, and when Emma did finally look up, she saw her same fond smile for him mirrored on Regina.

Regina caught her eye and flashed away—before Emma could say something, she launched into a lengthy description of jam-making for Henry. Her pallid face and the bruises under her eyes made Emma suspect she hadn’t slept at all the night before, but she still managed to smile for Henry and answer all his constant questions.

“I wanna help,” Henry decided, after listening the way he always listened, with deadly seriousness.

Regina bit her lip against a smile. Emma saw the characteristic creases at the corners of her mouth.

“The strawberry patch should be ripe soon,” Regina said. “We can go berry picking and I’ll show you then.”

When Henry was finished and ran off to play, Emma cleared her throat. Regina had started clearing away their picnic, and she was suddenly very interested in twisting the lid on the jar of blackberry jam.

“Look what Henry left me this morning,” Emma said.

Regina smiled when she saw the note and for a moment the awkwardness between them dissipated. Henry was a safe subject. “He’s improving.”

“I know.”

Regina raised an eyebrow.

Emma threw up her hands. “Fine, fine. You told me so.”

“You should try some simple numbers next.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Regina froze.

Emma groaned. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. It was a joke. I didn’t mean…”

“Emma. It’s fine.” Regina relaxed. “Go clean up the eggshells before I get ants.”

Emma was relieved for the companionable silence as they worked. Last night they had broached something dangerous. Something that could send their rocky trust of each other toppling. She thought of a tree in the woods, falling with no one to hear. No witnesses. No one to tell the story. That’s what it would be. A sudden end without resolution.

Emma was afraid she wouldn’t see Regina in the kitchen that night. For some reason it was important. One night she could understand, but two nights was a pattern. A message.

She’d risked Regina’s anger by going to her room the night before. She’d almost gotten what she’d expected, been shut out with no further explanation. Instead, by the time she left, warmth licked up her hands from the places where they had been on Regina’s body.

Her insides squirmed. Regina’s body. It had started so innocently, her desire to comfort Regina, coax back the woman from the garden who played with Henry and every once in a while looked up to flash her a secret smile.

Her hands had gone instinctively to Regina’s waist, and suddenly it hadn’t seemed so innocent after all. Except then Emma couldn’t stop, she stood so close she was able to breathe in the scent of earth and apples. She smelled so good, Emma didn’t want to pull away, and Regina, why didn’t Regina stop her? Was it encouragement or resignation when she felt all the tension bleed out of Regina’s limbs.

When she returned to her own chambers she went into the bathroom and cried. There’d been a tenderness in the way Regina said goodbye, cradling her cheek before sending her to bed. She’d tried to imitate the feeling by cupping her own face, pressing her fingers to the places where she could still feel the impression left by Regina’s hand.

She ached for a moment like that to come again. She wouldn’t ask for anything else. Just once, so she could lock the memory away and keep it with her when she had to go home.

“Miss.” A servant at the door.

Emma looked up.

“The Mistress requests your presence.”

Emma’s pulse sped up. “Where?”

The servant’s eyes twinkled with the thrill of the gossip he was about to bring back to his fellows. “In her private rooms.”

Private.

Emma’s face burned.

((()))

Regina had a kettle over her hearth when Emma stepped into the apartment. She saw an array of teacups, and bowls of sugar and cream, already prepared.

Regina didn’t remark on this new arrangement. Emma hadn’t really expected an explanation and she didn’t get one.

But as she sat and watched Regina stoke the fire, she felt like she owed her something. Regina had given all her secrets away, and her privacy too, and she’d asked for nothing in return.

“Do you want to know about Henry’s father?” she blurted.

Regina gave no indication that this question surprised her. She straightened, brushed off her hands, and returned to the sofa.

“Do you want to tell me?”

Emma could tell she was making an effort to sound casual. She swallowed and felt uncertain. She pressed on. “Do you want to know his name?”

Regina’s expression relaxed. She reached and placed her hand over Emma’s, squeezing lightly before drawing back. “If you would like to tell me, I would like to know.”

Emma breathed shakily. She hadn’t said it——when had she last said it?

“Bael.”

The name didn’t manifest his presence in the room as she had feared. It was just an empty sound in the air.

Regina leaned back against the arm of the sofa and said, in her most careful voice, “A common name.”

“Hah. Yeah. I guess.”

“And what was this Bael like?”

Emma licked her lips. “Don’t…judge me, ok?”

Regina’s eyebrows shot up. “Emma, what in the world could I possibly have to judge you for?”

“It’s just, I was young and stupid and I didn’t——if I’d just stopped to think a second——”

“Emma.”

Regina’s voice was a breeze gentling the storm in her head.

“Breathe.”

Emma rubbed her knuckle underneath her eyes, just in case there were any tears, but found them dry, which was at least one thing.

“Emma, you don’t have to tell me.”

Regina studied her with concern, and Emma didn’t understand how she’d managed to earn such genuine affection.

“But you’ve told me all your secrets. I made you tell me, and——”

“Emma, first of all. I didn’t tell you all my secrets.” She winked, making Emma blush. “We’d be here all night if I did that.”

Emma didn’t find herself entirely opposed to that idea.

“Secondly, I freely chose to tell you my story. Nothing you could have said would have convinced me if I’d made my mind up otherwise.”

Suddenly, Regina’s hand was on hers again, and she looked down to see her fingers tangled up in knot; she pried her fingers from the half-moon marks she’d made on her own skin.

Regina looked at her for permission. She swallowed and nodded. Regina smoothed out Emma’s palms and folded their hands together. “Emma, we can talk about something else.”

“No, no, I just. I never talk about him. Even to Red and Granny.”

“Does Henry know?”

Emma shook her head. “Henry has a family,” is all she said. “Bael…he didn’t believe in fathers.”

Regina scoffed. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Bael…he was a lot of things. He was born in a wealthy family, but his father was arrogant and lost their fortune. They were beggars. His father got sick and died. Bael took care of his mother and sister at first, doing odd jobs and pick-pocketing. Then he decided to be a highwayman. He…he felt like the world owed him something, because his father had gambled away the life he was supposed to have. That’s how he told it to me, the robbery and killings.”

“Killings?”

“It happened sometimes, during the raids. Always by accident. A lot of traveling caravans have their own guards to take care of bandits. They work out deals, pay them off, or drive them off if they can’t be bought. But murder attracts authorities——local lords and sheriffs, you know.”

“Emma…were you involved with this?” Regina whispered.

Emma’s eyes widened in alarm. “No! He would just…tell stories about how he got his loot. He probably embellished things. I wasn’t that stupid. I didn’t believe everything he told me.”

“How did you meet?”

Emma blushed. “He started coming around Blow’s Tavern. I was a…waitress there.”

Regina’s eyes narrowed. “Emma…even I know what it means to waitress at a place like that.”

“No, no! It wasn’t like that. Well…sometimes. But it was always over the clothes stuff. I was a v-virgin, you know? They liked that. Mostly they just teased me and left me tips if I teased back.”

“Emma.”

“Well, ok, sometimes we went round the back and I…you know. Got ‘em off.”

Regina’s hands tightened round hers.

“But Bael was different. He didn’t pay for that kind of thing. He came every night and we talked and he told me stories and he was…he was nice to me. He never teased or made lewd comments. His eyes never even wandered. I was eighteen. A man had never treated me like that before. I know I was stupid to trust him, to not understand the game he was playing with me. The other girls even warned me. But he was charming. And handsome, in a scrappy sort of way. I always believed I’d never come to be worth anything. Me and the other girls…we knew there was a good chance we’d end up dead in the river or a ditch somewhere one day.

“Anyway. He got what he wanted eventually. He had his own room that he stayed in that overlooked the river——the pretty part of it, before it gets into the slums and turns gray. Had a door with a lock and everything.” She chuckled nervously. “I guess I had to get it over with at some point, and he wasn’t terrible. He explained everything that was happening and…when he went into me, it was gentle. I agreed to it. I wanted it, even. I loved him. He only got a little rough at the end, but the girls said that would happen. After that it was OK. I spent whole days in his bed sometimes. He fed me and clothed me and I had a roof over my head and for once in my life I wasn’t so afraid. I even gained weight.

“Emma…”

“Well, you know. I got pregnant and that was the end of it. The girls said there were things you could do, herbs and things, but Bael didn’t give me anything when I left and I…I couldn’t afford it.

“I still thought somehow I’d get rid of it and everything would be ok, he’d take me back. But then one day I saw him in Blow’s with a new girl——younger than I’d been when he met me and prettier, and much more willing to sit on his lap and let him touch her in public.” She shrugged. “I went a little crazy. Drank myself stupid and wandered around in a blizzard until I ended up with Red. I don’t remember any details from that night, only the cold. My hands were blue——I forgot how to feel pain. I couldn’t feel anything. I figured I’d die and that was fine. Bael was the one bright spot in my life, the one thing that made me believe that maybe there was a better sort of world out there, but. There is no better world. Not for me.”

“Emma, don’t say that,” Regina whispered, bringing their joined hands up to her chest and cradling them there. Emma closed her eyes and let their warmth sink together. She concentrated on the pulse under Regina’s ribcage that she could feel through her hands.

“It’s true,” Emma whispered back. Their noses nearly brushed. “But it’s ok. It’s ok now. Henry…he’s all that matters. He can have a better world. I can give him that.”

Regina closed the distance between them and bumped their foreheads.

Regina held her so tenderly. She held Emma like she was maybe something that might be precious.

Bael——he’d been kind but playful, teasing. All her declarations of love he responded to with a twinkle in his eye before changing the subject. He talked a lot. Told her stories. But when she tried to tell her own stories he’d distract her with sex.

Regina wasn’t playful at all. She was deadly serious. Emma could feel the tension rippling beneath her skin. She was angry. She was livid.

It hit Emma, that if Bael had appeared right then, Regina would have killed him. Without hesitation. And though the realization warmed her, Emma didn’t want her to kill people anymore. At least, not anyone she didn’t have to. She wanted Regina’s soul to be as intact as possible. 

((()))

Regina didn’t know when she decided she was going to kiss Emma Swan. One moment that wasn’t even a distinct possibility, and the next she was leaning her torso forward.

Emma lifted her eyes. They stared at each other. Emma’s gaze flicked down to her mouth and back up. She knew what Regina intended.

She didn’t recoil.

She just stared at Regina and waited patiently.

She wasn’t going to do it herself, Regina realized.

In her youth there’d been a stable-boy named Daniel. They’d grown up together. He kissed her in the corner of a stall one day when they were thirteen and they fumbled at each other over the tops of their clothes. She had just learned that her mother intended to lock her away with the Dark One for the rest of her pubescent years, and she was terrified she’d never get another chance to kiss a boy if she didn’t take advantage of Daniel’s infatuation with her.

Daniel had crushed their mouths together and they’d frozen against each other, unsure what should follow.

Emma held herself perfectly still.

All Regina’s experiences of love had come from stories.

She’d always been afraid she wouldn’t recognize desire if she ever felt it.

But every inch of her skin seemed to pop and tickle, straining towards Emma though she didn’t move, didn’t yet close the distance between them.

Emma closed her eyes and opened her mouth ever so slightly, forming a tiny ‘o’ with her lips.

Regina wanted to press her tongue there.

Their mouths pushed together. It was the same as with Daniel. But this time Regina’s body reacted on instinct, and after a moment of gentle contact, she licked the opening of Emma’s mouth.

Emma sighed and warm air blew across Regina’s throat.

Regina lurched forward with a shudder. She froze, afraid to startle Emma, to press too hard.

Then Emma released the tiniest sound, a whimper that traveled down Regina’s body like physical touch. The whimper became a moan of displeasure, as Emma opened her mouth further, searching for her. Their eyes were closed, noses crushed together, breath spooling over each other in heavy, warm puffs.

Regina entered Emma’s mouth with her tongue.

She released herself to it, the rush of heat that coiled in her lower stomach and made her hips give a little, inadvertent jolt.

Emma shifted forward onto her knees. Her mouth was slick and silky and at once Regina couldn’t get enough of it. She cradled Emma’s face and tugged the other woman down on top of her. Emma went willingly. Regina curled her hands around the back of her neck and down her spine, feeling each elegant ridge through Emma’s loose sleep shirt. She followed it all the way down to the slight swell of her hips but didn’t dare go further.

Besides, she was content with things as they were, Emma’s warm, sturdy weight on top of her, exactly like she hadn’t known she wanted.

Emma’s mouth was so pliant and willing against Regina’s tongue.

Regina took her time. She explored all of Emma’s mouth. She licked into her, swiped her tongue along Emma’s teeth, curled it to the rood of Emma’s mouth.

Emma sighed and settled more fully on top of her. Even through her underthings and dressing gown, she could feel the warmth radiating from Emma’s body, and her hands never stopped roaming, nudging Emma’s shirt up slowly, stopping to explore every new expanse of exposed skin.

She was so soft. Regina ached at her softness. There were tiny, soft hairs just above her buttocks. Her hands ranged first up the slight pouch of her belly, then the firm abdominal muscles beneath her clenched. Regina hummed.

“P-proud of yourself?” Emma gasped.

If she was able to talk, Regina was not doing her job. She bit down on Emma’s lower lip and Emma lurched forward, disconnecting their mouths so she could bury her face in Regina’s shoulder. She parted her lips and licked a long strip down to Regina’s collarbone.

Regina gasped and squeezed Emma’s torso; Emma drew back, looking pleased with herself.

Regina tightened her grip and hoisted them into a sitting position. With legs entangled, they pressed their foreheads together. Their chests heaved in synchronization. Regina swallowed great gulps of air. Her vision was spotty. She was pretty sure she’d forgotten to breathe.

“You gotta breathe through your nose,” Emma said against her lips.

“Oh, like you’re the expert,” Regina said.

“You have to admit, I’m pretty good.” Emma wiggled her eyebrows.

Regina’s heart contracted.

She cleared her throat and continued the game. “Says the one who lost her mind when I did this.” With the lightest of touches, Regina rucked up Emma’s shirt again and skirted down her sides with the tips of her nails. When Emma’s eyes fluttered she pressed harder, earning a groan.

“Not fair.” Emma shuddered and whimpered when Regina rached the V that tapered down to her waistband. Her abdomen clenched, the smooth expanse of muscle contracting underneath Regina, who watched in fascination and felt again the jolt of heat as her body told her in no uncertain terms what it wanted.  
  
She brought her lips to Emma’s ear. “See,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady so Emma couldn’t see how affected she really was.

But Emma scanned her face with the knowing expression Regina as beginning to be familiar with. Emma opened her mouth to speak…then paused a moment to catch a lock of errant hair and tuck it back in place behind Regina’s ear. She trailed her fingers through the sweat that had gathered in a light sheen just below her earlobe.

“I see,” Emma said at last.

Regina shuddered. Her eyes closed. She tried to think of a clever rebuttal but her mind was fuzzy and she didn’t want to, didn’t care about winning their word games, just wanted to keep feeling the calloused pads of Emma’s fingers tracing nonsensical patterns absently on the surface of her skin.

Their skin cooled, sweat grew sticky, and Emma leaned forward slowly, eye on Regina as she did, to press their lips together. She kissed her once, twice, hard and close-mouth, the pressure nearly knocking Regina backwards.

She tasted salt, but couldn’t tell if it came from sweat or tears——not wanting to look, not wanting to know. She sought out Emma again and kissed her fiercely, but not demanding further access.

“What are we doing?” Emma whispered, and suddenly she wasn’t so open to Regina, so willing and soft.

Regina plummeted back to the cold room in the tower in which she was a prisoner.

Her chest, which had felt like bursting a moment ago, snapped closed.

“Following our hearts,” she said sarcastically.

Emma huffed in a not-quite laugh and leaned her cheek on Regina’s shoulder. Regina was relieved not to have to look into her face.

“This isn’t a redemption story, remember?” she said softly, coaxing her fingers through the messy locks of Emma’s yellow hair.

Despite that, it was so easy not to move…to linger there in each other’s embrace. Regina had never known the sensation of bodies linked, pressed so close you couldn’t tell where either of you ended or began. The universe cycloning down to consume just the two of you.

How easy it would be to be consumed.

She wouldn’t even have to think about it.

She’d thought it might repulse her to be so close to another person like this, sharing space and breath and sweat. But she never wanted to let go. Emma was so solid, so real against her. The realest thing, in a world that, for her, existed only beyond closed windowpanes and locked doors. The relief of an ache she hadn’t even known was there. She’d grown used to it, she supposed, that part of her that she only noticed once it was gone.

All the tension, the yearning of years and years washed out as Emma wrapped arms around her waist and pulled her close, and Regina received the message; they didn’t have to think or talk about it, any of it. Not tonight.

She wound her arms around Emma’s neck and rested their heads together. Emma nuzzled down into her shoulder.

If the desire she’d felt before had been sparking and static and rolling heat, this was an easy, gentle warmth.

They held each other. For a long time. So long the embers burned out in the hearth. Emma moved once to reach for the candle on the table and snuff it out with her forefinger and thumb. They were cast into darkness. Somehow that made it all the more real; your eyes, they played tricks, your mind interpreted what it wanted to see. But the body knew.

Regina realized belatedly that she was swaying them back and forth, humming a lullaby meant for children. She flushed.

“No, no,” Emma mumbled. “Don’t stop.”

Regina carded her hands through Emma’s hair in a gesture that she knew she was already hopelessly addicted to.

“My father sang this song to me. Did you hear it as a child?”

“No. I’ve never heard it before. But I feel like a I know it. Like from a dream I had once.

Regina smiled. “You probably just heard me humming it to Henry.”

((()))

Sunlight filtered down onto Emma as she woke.

Regina stood at the window in a silk robe that cut off at her knees. Her ankles were bare; Emma watched their delicate motions as Regina turned to face her.

“Good morning,” she said, softening with the affection that Emma was becoming so used to seeing there.

“Where’s Henry?” she asked, rubbing her eyes and swinging her legs off the sofa——and out from beneath a knit blanket Regina must have thrown over her during the night.

“I sent Elsie to keep an eye him. You fell asleep, I didn’t have the heart to wake you.”

Emma surveyed the lumps of ashy remnants in the fireplace, and the tea things that had been disregarded once they’re discovered other, better things to do. She blushed——somehow they’d both managed to stay full clothed, and though their hands wandered, nothing became of it. Emma couldn’t remember falling asleep.

“Where did you sleep?” she asked.

Regina smiled in reassurance. “I slept in my own bed, Emma.”

From the hall there came a knock on the door. “That should be breakfast.”

“Henry’s gonna wonder why I wasn’t there,” Emma said.

“I did make sure Elsie was with him,” Regina said as she answered the door. “He wasn’t alone.”

Emma watched her go; her back was too straight, her voice too reserved and clipped.

Like she was already beginning to close herself off.

Emma couldn’t even blame her. She wasn’t wrong. Emma would do it too, if the situation were reversed.

She gave an undignified stretch while Regina wasn’t there to see it and then folded the blanket over the back of the sofa. She felt like she should make things look as if she’d never been there. Then Regina wouldn’t have to see, and remember.

She found the bathroom; the Keep had a complex plumbing system that you only saw in castles of this kind, or manors with the size and fortune to afford it. She was still a little bit awed by the creamy-colored floor tiles and clawfoot bathtubs that could have easily fit two or three people. She curled her toes on the cool tile and noticed the scent that lingered, sweet apple and spice, and something a little musky that intensified when she pressed her nose to the fluffy white towel hanging on a hook.

She’d already been intoxicated by Regina’s perfume every time she so much walked into a room, but this was something else, something new that she had discovered last night, when their skin had slicked together and she’d tongued the sweat at the column of Regina’s throat.

She squeezed her eyes closed against the rush of heat that pooled in her belly.

She did her business and washed her hands, unable to get rid of the memory that was Regina; Regina’s smooth olive-toned skin, and the hollow at the base of her throat, the tightness in her thighs when Emma bit down just a little too hard and her lips, her soft slick mouth that had turned her brain to such hopeless mush that she could remember very little else of the specifics.

She splashed herself with cold water and waited for the pulsing between her legs to ease, so that maybe she could start to breathe again and return to the other room without the telltale flush on her face.

When she was with Bael it had been much the same, her body a betrayal of arousal and need.

But with Bael there was always this sense that she was walking on the knife’s edge of danger. It was hot and alluring and seductive. It set her on fire.

With Regina she was never afraid. She hadn’t been for what felt like a long time, though so few weeks had actually passed, out in the real world.

How easy it was, to think of that place as other, disconnected from her life and unnecessary, when she had all her wants and needs accounted for within the walls of this castle.

She smoothed the knots from her hair with Regina’s silver-handled brush. There was nothing to be done about the red marks scattered across her neck and shoulders, but she touched each one and shivered imagining it was Regina instead.

She’d find a high-collared shirt later, so Henry wouldn’t see.

She returned to the parlor and found Regina there——sitting and staring at nothing, lips pursed, posture straight and stern.

Emma shifted uneasily. “Regina?…Regina, I know you probably want to talk——and I understand it can’t happen again. Please don’t think that I expect anything, I just——well, you kissed me first but I didn’t stop you, maybe I should have, I don’t know, I…”

Regina blinked furiously at Emma, like she was trying to decipher a foreign language. Emma wondered if this was a message in itself, that Regina wanted to pretend the whole thing hadn’t ever happened.

“Um…where’s breakfast?”

Regina shook herself and finally seemed to see Emma. “I…what?”

“You promised me breakfast. This——” she patted her belly. “Requires sustenance.”

At the very least that should have earned a fond but exasperated smile. Her favorite expression on Regina, which she tried to draw out often. But the other woman’s face stayed carefully blank and her lips pursed in a straight line.

“Aw, come on,” she said, beginning to get nervous. “Look, if you wanna just…forget the whole thing happened, ok? It won’t happen again, I swear.”

“Emma.”

Emma’s mouth snapped closed.

Regina sighed and reached for Emma’s hands. “Sit, please.”

Emma sat beside her and didn’t draw away when Regina kept their hands folded.

“A messenger boy arrived this morning,” Regina said. “With news.”

Emma’s thoughts flashed to Red, who they’d never been able to find, even though Regina had sent a whole host of scouts out to track her down. Which meant either Red had already crossed the border and was well on her way to the capitol, or she’d been caught. In which case, they’d probably dumped the body somewhere as a warning, or buried it deep in the woods where it would never be found.

Emma didn’t realize she was shaking until Regina was clutching her arms and pulling her close. “Emma…darling, what’s wrong? You’re shaking.”

“Is it Red?” Emma croaked.

Regina’s face cleared. She smoothed back Emma’s hair. “No, they would have told me…no. This is something else. I…I’d better just show you.”

She led Emma to the window and pointed.

A column of smoke rose from an encampment on the other side of the river, opposite from the village. She recognized the blue banners of Snow White.

“Is it soldiers?”

Regina rubbed soothing circles in the small of her back. “There are some yes, but they’re not here to fight anyone. They’re the queen’s guard.”

“Why are they here?”

Regina raised an eyebrow. “To protect the queen, of course.”

“The queen’s here?”

“It would appear so.”

“Why?”

Regina’s hand fisted the back of Emma’s shirt.

“She wants to speak to me.”

((()))

“Why she couldn’t send advance notice…or at least ask for an invitation…I mean as a formality, that’s not asking for much!…of course not, the world revolves around Snow White…does whatever she wants when she wants…realms forbid she ever stop and consider she might be unwanted…an inconvenience…”

And so on.

Regina paced the length of her apartments, muttering to herself, stopping sometimes to fix her hair in the mirror, or freeze at the window and glare at the smoke rising above the tents as if she could set the whole camp aflame.

Emma tried to follow her around at first, offering small and useless comforts. Then tried to get her to eat something, then asked if she would at least sit down. Someone sent for Henry, who was not at all pleased that he had been ignored all morning, and for a moment that seemed to calm Regina, but then Henry got bored in her arms and once she was no longer holding him, she returned to her previous frenzied state.

“What does she want, do you think?” Emma asked.

“For me to do her a favor, I’m sure,” Regina said. “Or blame me for something my mother did.”

((()))

At midday , a procession snaked its way up the winding road to the Keep. From Regina’s room, they were high enough to see over the walls and track its progress as it came more and more into view, revealing the bold shining banners, the royal carriage resplendent with its gilding of gold and silver. On either side were soldiers on horseback, befitted with the queen’s colors and sitting astride battle horses.

They stopped a distance from the gate of the Keep. The carriage door opened and a figure stepped out, face shielded by the hood of their cloak.

Emma looked at Regina.

“Too tall to be the queen,” Regina said. “An ambassador, maybe, or herald.”

They lost sight of the figure behind the outer wall for a moment, then the front gates opened and it reappeared, this time with its hood drawn down.

A noise caught in Emma’s throat.

“Emma? What’s the matter?”

“It’s Red.”

“That’s Red?”

She heard Regina call after her but she had already run the length of the room.

When she reached the domed hall, Red stood at in the entryway, peering around apprehensively. When she saw Emma, she gave a little whimper, but didn’t move. “Is it really you?”

Emma offered her arms. “It’s me.”

Red hesitated. “This isn’t…one of that woman’s tricks?”

Emma didn’t know whether she was going to laugh or cry. “It’s me, I swear. Ask me anything, something only I would know.”

Red sniffled. “Um…what was Henry’s first word?”

“Your name. But he couldn’t get the ‘R’ sound right.”

Red started crying in earnest then, and they met halfway, grasping each other tightly, and for a while they just stood there, wrapped in the protective shroud of Red’s cloak.

“Henry,” Red said as she pulled back.

“He’s fine. He’s more than fine.”

“How?”

“Regina.”

“Who?”

“Sorry—the witch.”

“What? You let her near him? She’s a monster, Emma, wait till you hear—”

“That’s quite enough of that.”

The sound of Regina’s pointed boots echoed in the empty hall.

Red’s mouth moved but no sound came out.

It took Emma a second to realize what had happened. “Regina!” she scolded.

“I dislike being insulted in my own home. Absurd, I know.”

Emma rolled her eyes. “Just make it stop. You’re scaring her.”

Regina sighed and flicked her hand; a wave of purple smoke coursed over Red, who waved at it in terror. But when it had dissipated she touched her throat and croaked, “Emma.”

“It’s ok,” Emma promised. “Red, this is Regina. She’s…she’s my friend.”

“Some friend.”

“That was just…a misunderstanding. She’s not going to do it again. Is she?”

“Fine,” Regina said, adopting a bored expression. “Not to her, anyway.”

“Fine,” Emma said. “Red, she saved Henry. You’ll see. He was getting worse and you were gone, I didn’t know what to do. We needed a witch to save him——well, Regina’s the best. I’m stupid for not thinking of it before.”

“Emma—”

Emma grabbed Red’s hands. “Please forgive me. This is my fault. I hated the thought of you out there all alone, and knowing it was all for nothing.”

“Emma.” Red’s touched Emma’s cheek and gave her a sad, sad smile that Emma didn’t understand. “Not for nothing.”

Before Emma could ask her what she meant, Regina asked, “How did you survive out there, anyway? The Enchanted Forest isn’t known for their love of your kind. Yet you prance up to my castle escorted by the queen herself.”

Emma frowned. “Yeah…why are you with the queen? That was her carriage, wasn’t it?”

“Yes. And she’s probably wondering what’s taking so long.”

“So long to do what?” Regina in her heels stood at Red’s height, close to Emma’s elbow…in a position to block Emma if necessary.

Emma felt frustrated that Regina didn’t seem to understand—Red was on their side. She wanted what was best for Henry, that’s all any of them wanted, and this posturing was a waste of time.

A door slammed from within the castle and then they heard the patter of shoes on the marble floor. A minute later, Henry appeared at the top of the stairs, a bedraggled maid two steps behind, hissing furiously, “Slow down!” and “Don’t interrupt!”

But Henry had seen Red by now; he shrieked her name and ran down the stairs as fast as he could on his pudgy little legs.

Red rushed to be meet him, and by the time he was in her arms she was crying again.

He was happy to see her but alarmed; he patted her cheeks, trying to look at her teary eyes, but she gripped him close, pressing her face into the top of his head and inhaling.

Finally, she calmed down enough to wipe her own tears off Henry’s nose. He watched in her concern. He wasn’t used to seeing Red cry.

Emma wasn’t either.

“Hi baby.” Red rubbed her eyes on her sleeve. “How are you feeling?” She checked his pulse, and forehead for fever, and his arms and fingers and toes while he chatted to her about all the things that had happened since she had been away. Once Red had assured herself of his safety, she blew a raspberry in his ear, making him dissolve into giggles.

Emma knew Regina was watching. Red and Henry had a natural ease between them, a bond that hailed all the way back to the days when Emma had refused to so much as acknowledge his existence.

She’d never, ever tried to usurp Emma’s place as his mother, but what they had was something else, equally as special and just as precious. Being Henry’s caretaker had always been something Emma had to think about, make a conscious effort in. Red just did it like breathing.

“Gina!”

Henry dragged Red across the hall and very importantly made all the introductions. He beamed up at the circle of his three favorite people in the world—because, yes, Emma knew, she didn’t know how but she knew, that Regina now counted among them. It occurred to her that Regina’s fears might all be for nothing, and they were too closely bound now for Emma and Henry to pick up where they’d left off, resume their old lives as if Regina had never existed.

A man poked his head around the corner. “Uhh, Mistress?”

“What is it, Renaldo?”

“There’s, er…another woman asks your permission to enter.”

Regina raised her eyes to the heavens. “Fine. Let’s get this over with. Send in the queen.”

“It’s not the queen, Mistress.”

It was a woman Emma didn’t recognize, with long raven hair, too young to be the queen. She had her hand cautiously on the hilt of her sword.

“Mulan?” Red said.

“Thank the realms,” said the woman when she saw Red. She stopped when she noticed Emma and Regina and Henry. “I—we thought something might have happened to keep you so long.”

“I’m fine.”

Mulan snorted. “You walked by yourself unarmed into the lion’s den, I don’t know why you thought that was a good idea—”

“I’d like to think I’m cleanlier than a lion,” Regina muttered.

Mulan, belatedly, seemed to realize who she was looking at and snapped to attention.

Regina arched her brow. “Do you see that any harm has come to the girl?” For a heartbeat, Emma saw the twinkle of amusement in her eyes. A couple of months ago, she had been standing where Mulan was now, challenging a witch who would have been queen, and commanded the regal bearing as if she was.

Regina loved this game. She thrived in it.

Mulan tilted her head and murmured, “Your…highness?”

“You know.” Regina tapped her chin. “I do like the sound of that.” She flashed playful grin at Emma, who was too charmed to disapprove. Then she caught Red watching her with too much thoughtfulness, and suddenly found herself overly fascinated with her shoes.

“If Snow White wants to talk to me, she can come in here herself,” Regina said.

“She doesn’t want to talk to you. She wants to see her,” Mulan said, gesturing to Emma.

“Me?”

Regina, with the slightest of sidesteps, managed to put herself directly between Emma and the solider, but Emma squeezed her shoulder. She had a feeling she knew what this was about.

“Please,” she said to Mulan. “Please, don’t let her punish Red for this—it was my idea. My son was sick, I was trying to save him, I didn’t know Regina was going to help me. We thought we had no other choice.” She closed her eyes. “I should have gone myself——”

“No, Emma,” Red said.

“I should have. It was selfish. He’s just as much yours as he is mine, and we didn’t know what would happen, he could have——he could have…and you wouldn’t have been there. You could have been killed.” Emma’s heart stopped. She could have lost both of them.

“Emma.” Red picked up her hand and held it between both of hers. “Emma, please listen. That’s not why we’re here. Why she’s here…” She gestured in the direction where, outside, the carriage waited. Her expression was the most solemn Emma had ever seen it, something stole over her then, a creeping sense that whatever Red was about to say wasn’t something she wanted to hear.

“Can’t she just…go away?” Emma asked.

“Oh, Emma.” Red drew her into an embrace. Emma closed her eyes and held on.

“Don’t say it. Whatever it is, don’t say it.”

Red cupped her face. “It’s good. I swear it. It’s going to change everything, but it’s going to be so good.”


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is nsfw for smut!

Emma’s friend, Red, cried silently as Emma was escorted by Mulan out of the castle. Regina had half a mind to bar the door, snap it locked with the strongest magic she knew, before Emma could cross the threshold and be taken away to whatever was waiting for her out there.

As soon as they were gone, Regina whirled around. “Alright,” she snapped at Red. “Tell me what’s going on. Now. What does that vile woman want with Emma?”

“She’s not vile,” Red said tiredly. “She’s actually quite lovely. It makes it hard to hate her.”

“That’s exactly why I do hate her.”

Something about that got a smile from Red.

“Gina.”

Henry stared in concern at the door his mother had gone through without him.

“C’mere, love,” Regina said, and Henry hugged her legs. She stroked his hair. “Mama’s going to be right back.”

“Where she goin’?”

“To talk to someone very important.”

“Oh…Who?”

“A queen.”

Henry’s eyes just about blew open at that. “Real queen? Not sto-ry?”

Regina’s heart ached with affection for him. “A very real, live one. Would you like to see?”

Henry hesitated. “She a nice queen?”

Regina smiled for his sake and lifted him up in her arms. “Come look.”

She carried him to the window, where he was immediately taken by the royal procession waiting in the courtyard.

Regina left him there, to enjoy whatever last few minutes of his old life he was about to get.

“Now.”

Red took a deep breath and nodded. “OK.”

And then Red told her a story that she already knew.

A story that had imprinted itself on her like a wax seal, long ago, defining everything about what she knew and who she was.

A story she had lived.

It was a stilted telling, because Red had obviously heard it secondhand, but all the important pieces were there; a princess and a promise, wrapped up and exchanged, with nothing less than entire kingdoms at stake.

Emma must’ve been hearing the same story out there in the carriage with Snow White.

Regina sank against the wall. “How do you know all this?”

“The Dark One told me.”

Regina’s head snapped up. “Excuse me?”

“In the dungeon, when I was taken prisoner in the city.”

“He was there?”

Red gave her a strange look. “They caught him for something, I never find out what. He made a bargain for his freedom——told the queen that he would lead her to someone who could help her find her daughter. He knew I was coming, somehow.”

“He has his ways,” Regina said.

“The castle guards captured me. They asked me a hundred questions. I didn’t know the answers to most of them. We went in circles for hours. When the Dark One got bored of torturing us all, he told them to ask me about Emma.”

Regina was cold. Freezing. Like the fire had gone out from inside her. “He…he knew?”

“I guess he did.”

Henry was looking at her curiously; she unfolded her fists and tried to breathe, not wanting to frighten him.

“He knew that Emma was Rosemary,” she said again.

She immediately wished she could take the words back, because saying them made them real, gave them a truth that had to be contended with or challenged, and could not be ignored.

“It sounds ridiculous,” Red said. “It is ridiculous. There are a million girls out there who grew up in orphanages and don’t know where they came from, and have flaxen hair and don’t remember life before they were five years old.”

Regina was looking at Henry. His hair was dark brown, nearly black.

That must have been what distracted her from the roundness of his cheeks and the tilt of his nose and the shape of his eyes, all once so familiar to her in that other child, that little girl she’d been meant to marry.

“They showed me a portrait,” Red said, and her voice had started to tremble now. “Of the Crown Prince. He’s only about Henry’s age, a few years older. The resemblance…they look like they could be brothers.”

Regina felt a shift in herself, then. In the place of her fire came a cold, white anger that settled itself in her chest and solidified around her heart. She felt it there as real as she could sometimes feel the purple magic that heated the surface of her skin.

She wanted to scream. She wanted to tear down this castle and everything in it.

But that was fire.

She was too cold to do any of that.

Instead she turned on Red. “And you just admitted all this to them?”

“What? Of course. It’s not exactly like I had a choice.”

“You always have a choice.”

“Should I have lied?” Red demanded.

Regina thought of Emma in the garden, her bright spirit when the sun shone down on her golden hair and she allowed herself to be happy. She thought of it being snuffed out or demented by court life and petty squabbles, the nobility and their politics and the two-faced games they played. She imagined this Keep, and the empty shell when Emma and Henry were gone, flown off to a life where she could never follow them.

“Yes, you should have,” she said, ice-cold.

“Why?”

Because,” she snapped. “You know what will happen now? They’ll steal her away from here and doll her up with gowns and make-up and send her off to balls and find her a prince and keep her locked up in a tower the rest of her life. She’ll be stifled and suffocated and miserable. That isn’t a life for her.”

Red raised her eyebrows in disbelief. “Are…are you actually angry about this? That for once in her life she’ll be spoiled and pampered and never have to worry for anything, and know that she is loved and wanted?”

“Those fops don’t love her. They want her like they want a symbol, something to believe in when people are dying around them and they can look to her and say she will save us, and then turn on her when she can’t.”

“Do you have any idea…any idea at all what her life has been like? She’s been beaten. She’s been battered and used and hungry and freezing to death. Don’t you think I want her to stay? I love her. She’s like my sister. But if there’s anyone in the world who deserves this…to learn that she is a long-lost princess whose family has never, not once, stopped looking for her, then it’s Emma.”

“She has a family.”

Realization began to dawn on Red’s face.

“What?” she snorted. “You thought you were going to be her family?”

“Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous. But you said yourself she’s like a sister.”

“Yeah, she is. And I love her enough to be happy for her. No matter what that means for me. Look, I don’t know what you’ve done to her, whatever little games you’ve been playing, but you listen to me. Emma is good. She has a good heart and she’s had a shit life. She deserves this. So if you’re not gonna step down. If you’re gonna confuse her or tempt her or, or…I don’t know, but I saw the way she looked at you, like you were the fucking sun, but she doesn’t know how to read people, she’ll fall in love with anybody who’s a little bit kind to her or shows her affection, and if you ruin this for her…so fucking help me, if you ruin this for her.”

Regina laughed, high and cold. “So what? What do you think you’re going to do to me, little wolf?”

Red snarled, and if she had been a wolf, Regina had no doubt her claws would have been at her throat.

“Uh uh,” she said with a smirk. “There are spells on this castle——your shape-shifting won’t work here.”

Red growled. “You’re every bit as wicked as they say, aren’t you?”

“That’s a matter of opinion,” Regina said coldly.

“Emma’s opinion?”

Regina scowled.

“Somehow you’ve…you’ve deceived her. I know it. I’m going to find out. I won’t let you destroy her.”

“I’m not the one who wants to destroy her.”

Ice shot through Regina’s blood, freezing her from the inside; a purple glow emanated from the surface of her skin, and this was a new kind of magic, one she hadn’t encountered before——instead of fire, ice. In place of heat, a deep-freeze.

A sound like ice cracking in the river came from the tips of her fingers, which felt bloated and eager, needing release.

“Gina?”

The roaring in her ears died. The crackling stopped.

Henry’s face was ringed with fear.

Regina brought herself back to earth; she killed the ice in her veins, finding the control only as she looked at the little boy, whose trust she couldn’t lose.

“Henry,” Red said. “Come here.”

Henry dallied between them, uncertain.

Regina let out a final breath. “It’s ok, Henry. Go to her.”

She didn’t trust him in her arms at the moment.

Henry took the cue and ran to Red, who scooped him up and cradled him against her chest. “We’re going to go home now, baby.”

“Mama?”

“Mama’s just outside. She’s gonna come get you.”

“Gina?”

“…Gina’s right there, see?”

Henry reached for her, and warmth flooded Regina’s chest; she closed her eyes and sighed in relief as the familiar fire brought sensation back to her bones.

“I’m ok now,” she said for Red’s benefit.

“He’s not yours.”

“I know.”

“You don’t get to keep him here.”

“Trust me,” Regina grit. “I’m well aware.”

Red relented.

Henry snuggled against her chest. “Garden?” he asked playing with her necklace.

“When Mama comes back.”

Henry sighed. “That’s forever.”

Regina tried to trap the scent of him. Maybe she could extract it, bottle it, put it besides Emma’s on a shelf somewhere, just to take out every once in a while and remember. It was soothing, reassuring somehow. She hadn’t known it was possible for a person’s scent to become so familiar. Horses yes. But not humans.

“Do you want to hear a story instead?”

Her voice came in a whisper, too close to cracking.

“Yes!”

“Alright, my love.”

She refused to look at Red as she carried Henry to the window and they watched the still, silent carriage, where inside she knew Emma’s world was being flipped on its head.

In barely a whisper, Regina spoke only for Henry. “Once upon a time, in a far off land, there lived a little prince…”

Henry was fast asleep in her arms by the time Emma emerged from the carriage. She was too far away for Regina to see her expression, but oh, how she longed to go to her.

_Rosemary._

She was beginning to recognize the resemblance. That face had become so familiar to her in the past few months that she hadn’t been able to step back and regard it objectively. She’d always been too close. She’d been too close from the beginning, from the moment the woman appeared on her doorstep with a child in her arms, a _child_, even though she knew, she had seen what Regina was capable of.

Maybe if she hadn’t been so consumed by her own plotting and scheming. Until Emma appeared, her agenda had been simple: Stop her mother. End the famine. A small, petty revenge, really, on her mother’s petty, meaningless grudge. It was the principle of the thing. She’d wanted to know, once and for all——was she capable of taking on her mother?

Now other desires crowded around this one.

Because it wasn’t Rosemary, not really. Rosemary was a specter trapped in the past. Emma, through sheer force of will, had asserted herself in that place.

She knew what would happen. She tried to accept it. Emma would die, over time; Snow White would kill her off and re-erect the daughter she’d lost, and Emma, dear Emma, who wanted so much to do right by the people she loved, would accept being remolded in the image of a princess who she couldn’t remember ever existing.

She hated Red for being right. Regina had to let her go. She would be happy there. It’s what she deserved. One day, maybe not so far in the future, she’d forget ever being the person who’d lived in a castle with a witch who had loved her.

Regina closed her eyes.

_Loved her._

As if she had any right.

The wide double doors opened.

Regina braced herself against an entourage, but only Emma appeared.

She looked so small.

Her face was frozen, numb.

Red approached, but Emma shrugged her off. She looked around and found Regina. And Henry.

Regina nudged the little boy awake.

“Mama,” he said groggily.

Regina gave the boy up to Emma, who hid her face behind him like a shield.

Without a word, she took her son and walked across the hall, heavy thud of her boots the only sound in the silence, and ascended the staircase.

“I’m going after her,” Red announced.

“Don’t.” Her own voice sounded hollow.

“You can’t stop me.”

“I _won’t_ stop you. But please. Give her time. She wants to be alone. She doesn’t like being vulnerable.”

“How do you know what she’s like?”

“Stop pretending that you aren’t jealous.”

“Jealous?”

“Yes. You’re not the only person who knows her, anymore.”

Red flushed.

There was no Henry now to stop them if they started a fight.

Regina was too tired to fight.

She waved her hand. The front door unlocked from the inside. “Stay or go. It makes no difference to me. If you’d like something to eat, the kitchen staff will help. Down the staircase, second passage to the right. I could ask the butler to show you to the parlor.”

The procession in the courtyard retreated, bit by bit, over the course of an hour. Snow was probably holding out hope that Emma would return. Regina felt a twinge of satisfaction._ It won’t be that easy, your majesty._ Emma wasn’t a baby anymore, to be bought with gifts and sweet words.

From the window of her bedroom, she eventually saw Red’s cloak flutter out the castle door; it looked like she was invited to return to the carriage, but she chose a horse instead, and rode away beside the soldier with raven hair.

((()))

“Do you want to be a prince, Henry?” Emma asked.

He studied her with owl eyes. He was so patient.

He lifted his arms so she could remove his shirt and put on his nightclothes.

“Do you?”

“Dunno.”

She could tell he knew there was something more to this. That it was some sort of trick question. Maybe she should have let Red take him with her. She’d be able to do right by him in a way Emma never could.

She had started to shiver, badly.

“You could live in a castle like this all the time. And——” She tried to think of things princes did in stories—— “and ride horses and learn sword-fighting. And have lots of toys to play with.”

There was an edge of hysteria in her voice. She swallowed.

The shivering had become more violent.

“Live with Gina?” he asked.

“What? No, no, not this castle. But kind of the same.”

“Mama,” Henry said, grabbing at her. “Where’s Red?”

Emma bit back a sob. “She…she had to go.”

“Where?”

“She’ll come back and visit tomorrow.”

Henry chewed his blanket thoughtfully. “Hungry,” he said.

Emma groaned. “Can’t you wait till breakfast tomorrow——no, no, never mind, of course you’re hungry. I’ll ask Elsie to bring something up.”

“Picnic?” Henry asked as she wiggled him out of his trousers.

“Not today.”

“Mama.”

He was too young to look so worried, with his little wrinkled forehead and frown.

She sat beside him on the bed and he crawled into her lap. She held him in place as she reached over the side of the bell to ring a little bell attached to the wall.

Elsie came in and took one look. “Shall I bring supper?” she said.

“Something for Henry.”

“And you?”

“No, please. Just Henry.”

When Elsie came back, she was carrying a tray of food that contained far more servings than Henry could eat by himself. Roast beef and pumpkin soup and an entire loaf of bread with butter. Sweet rolls and jam for dessert.

The sight rolled Emma’s stomach but she called out before the girl left.

“Elsie?”

“Yes, miss?”

“Thank you.”

She patted Henry’s back. “Hen…”

He blinked open his eyes.

“Still hungry?”

“Yes!”

“I was thinking…we could eat on the floor? Then it’s like an inside picnic.”

His eyes widened and then he nodded quickly in conspiracy, before she could take it back.

“But can’t tell Regina,” she said.

“Can’tell ‘Gina,” he said, giggling and scrunching his lips together.

She might as well have hung the moon.

She laid a sheet from their bed on the floor and arranged the food. Henry was too busy to notice that she served none for herself.

She wiped his mouth and made him eat soup before sweet rolls.

“Mama?” he said as he swallowed. “Where we goin’?”

“We’re not going anywhere. Not yet. Here, let me…” She confiscated the jam jar.

“When?”

“When what?” Emma licked a bit of jam that had got on her thumb. Blackberry. That would have been Regina’s request. It was Henry’s favorite.

“When we leavin’?”

Emma concentrated on arranging the used silverware in a pile on the tray.

“Mama?”

“I don’t know, Henry, Ok? I don’t know. Stop asking! I don’t know anything.”

Henry’s mouth snapped shut. He stared at her in shock.

She wished immediately that she could take it back. She never yelled at him. Not seriously. His face crumpled.

He was so sweet and good and patient, and he never complained. When she’d finally allowed him into her life, he’d attached himself to her at the hip. He loved her. It was the purest, most honest love Emma had ever been given. It was predicated on nothing except that she was his mother and that was enough. She was enough for him just by existing.

But she had to be better than that.

“Henry…”

His eyes squinted, a sign of oncoming tears. He hiccuped and his chin wobbled. Like he was trying not to cry.

She couldn’t stand it when he cried.

“Hen…don’t——don’t cry, ok? I’m sorry. That was mean. I’m sorry.”

She reached out but he wiggled away and wouldn’t let her touch him.

He was stubborn. Like her.

“’Gina,” he mumbled, face hidden in his sleeve.

“’Gina’s not…” She sighed. “Do you want me to get her?”

He peeked out. Red-rimmed eyes. Nodded.

“Fine, ok, just, wait a sec…”

She rang the bell and Elsie returned.

“Sorry…can you watch him for a second? I need to go get something.”

Elsie cooed as soon as she saw Henry curled up on the chair; she knelt beside him and rubbed his back and whispered something in his ear that made him look up. Everyone was a natural parent, apparently, except Emma.

Regina looked surprised to see her when she cracked open her door and looked out. “I didn’t think you would come.”

“Is this a bad time?”

“No, no…just reading.”

“It’s Henry. He asked for you.”

Now she had her full attention.

“What happened?”

Emma winced.

“Never mind. Just, come in and wait a moment…”

Emma loitered near the door and avoided looking at the sofa in the parlor.

She wondered if kissing Regina had plummeted them into an alternate reality, or flipped the world upside down. An impossible thing made possible. It stood to reason, then, that other impossible things were bound to happen. That was the sort of world she lived in now.

Regina returned in a robe, carrying a storybook.

Emma was getting sick of stories.

That’s what the queen had said in the carriage…I have a story to tell you, dear, so sickly sweet, like she’d already mapped out in her head what was going to happen after, a tearful reunion and rightful restoration of the heir to the throne.

Emma shoved the memory down, down, down. It might not be true. They could still be wrong. Maybe it was all a trick, and they’d plucked some orphan girl at random for some convoluted political reason she didn’t understand.

“Emma.”

Regina held her arm outstretched.

She let Regina take her hand. Her legs felt stiff. She couldn’t move on her own.

“Oh, darling. Come on.”

She let Regina lead her through the castle. Her grip was cool and firm. Her skin had the slightly calloused roughness of someone who had spent their life outside, riding and hunting, and gardening, too. But still gentle, so gentle, and Emma liked the roughness of them, because it was such a unique, specific sensation. It could only be Regina. Only Regina could possibly be holding her hand. She could close her eyes and let herself be led, and know Regina was there, just based on the feel of her.

Elsie had the situation under control by the time they arrived at Emma’s rooms. She and Henry sat on the bed, clapping each other’s hands in rhythm while she recited a children’s rhyme.

“Thank you, Elsie,” Regina said.

Henry’s head popped up.

“’Gina!”

He made grabbing motions towards her.

“Well, hello there, my little prince.”

Regina had to let go of Emma’s hand to pick up Henry. Emma whined involuntarily at the loss. Elsie gave her a curious look as she took the dinner tray and slipped out the door.

Henry settled on Regina’s lap and she opened the leather-bound storybook. It didn’t have the cracked, old look of her other children’s stories. In fact, it looked brand new.

In a wistful, rhythmic tone, Regina started to read. The story was about a young prince who bested his father’s strongest knight, not by sheer force, but by his wits. Henry leaned against her shoulder and chewed on the edge of the blanket as he listened. Over the course of the story he nodded off several times, only to jerk himself awake and whimper. Regina shushed him and stroked his arm until he drifted off to the soothing cadence of her voice. Emma, curled up in a chair across the room, almost fell asleep herself.

“What was that all about?” Regina whispered.

Emma lowered her eyes. “It’s my fault. I kind of lost my temper.”

“Emma…”

“I know, I know.”

Regina rolled her eyes. “I was going to say that it’s normal for tensions to be high during…well, a time like this. He won’t even remember in the morning.”

Emma laid her head on her arms. “He deserves better than me.”

“Emma, don’t say that.”

“It’s true. He deserves someone like…you or Red.”

“Emma. Emma, hey. You listen to me. Are you listening?”

Emma grunted.

“You care more for this little boy than anything else in this world. More than your own life.”

“But—”

“No. Who else would have done what you did to save his life?”

“I didn’t do anything.”

Regina scoffed. “You risked your life, multiple times. Decided to trust me when I didn’t deserve it. Sent those men to…well. You know. You were willing to pay the price. For him. No one in the world could have done more.”

Emma sniffled. Regina’s words came to her as if from a distance, an echo of an echo.

“Come here, darling.”

Emma surveyed the scene on the bed; Henry, snuggled beneath the blanket, the corner still in his mouth, Regina on the thick top quilt, the two of them bolstered by a circle of pillows.

“Emma.”

So that’s how the three of them ended up together on the bed, cocooned by a fortress of pillows and blankets, where the world, for one more night, couldn’t reach them.

Emma wrapped her arm around Regina’s torso and tucked her head beneath her chin. Regina was practically buried beneath both of them. Emma, ear against her chest, heard the other woman’s deep, pleased sigh, followed by even breathing as gentle and reliable as the tick of a clock.

Regina murmured a few words and the oil-lamps went out in the room.

It was easier to speak, then. The darkness carried the words away.

“Is it all true?” Emma whispered.

Regina pressed her mouth to the top of Emma’s head; Emma felt her nodding.

“Did you know?”

“I swear,” Regina said. “I had no idea. I didn’t believe it myself at first.”

“But you’re certain now.”

Regina hesitated. Then, in the lowest of murmurs; “I can see her all over your face. Rosemary, all grown up. You resemble your father more than Snow White though, I think.”

“Don’t say that name.”

“Snow White?”

“No, no. The other one.”

“Right. Of course. I won’t.”

Emma swallowed the lump in her throat. “How is this possible, Regina? How am I her?”

“I don’t…I don’t know. Emma…I thought I understood the way this world worked. The strong conquer the weak, and life is nothing more than a long series of losses. People that you lose…they don’t come back.” Regina’s voice cracked. “They aren’t supposed to come back.”

((()))

“You should go to bed,” Emma said.

“Mmm,” Regina said, though neither of them tried to move.

Henry snored lightly.

That was something else Regina needed to talk to Emma about. Henry.

But it didn’t have to be now.

“Sorry,” Emma whispered, finally shifting off the bed. “Give him to me.”

“Emma, it’s fine.”

“I’m putting him to bed,” Emma said.

The serious look in her eyes told Regina that that meant exactly what she thought it meant.

Trembling suddenly with anticipation, she snuggled Henry close for a moment more and inhaled the sweet shampoo scent of his hair. She kissed his forehead with the lightest brush of her lips, so as not to wake him, and then lifted him into Emma’s arms.

“I’ll be right back.” She paused, then reached out to touch Regina’s face. Regina covered her hand and held her there.

“Don’t…leave,” Emma said.

Regina nodded, kissed the palm of her hand, and let her go.

She turned down the blankets and set aside Henry’s book——because it was Henry’s book, her gift to him, though she wished she could give it to him under different circumstances. His birthday, or a holiday, or just because. Not as her final gift, before they never saw each other again.

“No, no,” Emma said when she returned.

Regina looked up.

Emma knelt on the bed and smoothed the lines on Regina’s forehead. “You’re not allowed to think about it anymore,” she whispered. “Not tonight.”

Then, never taking her eyes off Regina’s, she lifted her leg over Regina’s thigh and balanced over her lap.

Waiting. Asking for permission.

Regina trembled, anticipation racketing through her. She was afraid to touch. Afraid for it to begin, because it was so much nicer, in this moment before, that she wished they could stay there forever, hovered upon the precipice, knowing what was about to happen and never having to dread its end.

“I said stop,” Emma murmured.

Regina closed her eyes and tilted her head up. Fine. But she would not be responsible.

She expected a hesitant first kiss, a gentle parting of lips, to just breathe each other in for a moment.

Emma settled her full weight on Regina and pressed their mouths together——hard. Regina whimpered and laughed and wanted to cry, but then Emma’s tongue was in her mouth and she forgot why.

Once Emma was there she took her time, returning Regina’s favor from the night before, licking into her mouth and sucking her tongue and dragging her teeth against her bottom lip. And while she did that her hands went exploring, questing down Regina’s neck and across her collarbone, finding the flaps of her robe and pushing them apart.

Regina lifted her arms and let Emma remove it, revealing the night-gown underneath. Emma didn’t remove that at first, but found the bottom and shucked it up, skimming the swell of her belly and making Regina shiver, then going, not down, but up, coasting the sides of her waist to her breasts.

“Oh,” Regina breathed into her mouth.

Emma pressed harder down into her lap, and with her nightgown lifted there was nothing between Emma’s night trousers and the apex of Regina’s legs. She lifted her hips and Emma met them, and then Emma forgot her breasts in order to grab her waist and grind them together, harder and again and again until Regina thought she might cry from the pressure of it.

Then Emma stopped and smiled against her mouth.

“M-monster,” Regina groaned.

“Would a monster do this?” She wiggled away from Regina’s lips and paused above her chest, looking up and waiting again, for Regina to tell her it was alright.

“Just go, Emma, just go.”

Then Emma had to stop again and admire her breasts, skimming the roundness of them, and while Regina appreciated the awe on her face, every brush of their skin was like a ping down to her core, hot and swelling, and she pushed her hips up until at last Emma gave in and licked the top of her breast, just over her nipple. Regina gave a strangled noise between a whine and a moan, and then finally, finally Emma closed her lips around her nipple and sharp bursts of sweetness shot down, down, down to her belly. Emma, the fool, took her time, sucking and then pulling back to lick the tip, then taking as much of the flesh as she could in her mouth.

Then switching.

Regina had put her hands on Emma’s head as support, but as soon as she started closing the tips of her teeth over the skin above Regina’s nipple, she grabbed so hard that Emma moaned, a sound she liked so much that she did it again, just to hear it, except this time, Emma was still attached to her breast and the vibrations when shooting through her skin.

“Em—ma.”

Emma wiggled on top of her, her backside rising in the air, which, though covered, was absolutely not helping at all. Regina tugged her up so she could reach the curve of her buttocks and squeeze, which brought so much of its own pleasure that she did it again, and this time the sensation sent Emma’s hips crashing down into hers.

Her legs were spread now, and somehow the front seam of Emma’s pants rubbed almost perfectly across her outer lips, not quite where she needed it but close, so close that she clenched and felt herself soak the fabric of Emma’s pants.

“Oh…” She started to apologize but Emma was pressing open-mouthed kisses all the way down her neck and then biting along her collarbone, so her words came out as garbled sighs and squeaks, sounds she’d never even suspected she was capable of, and certainly would never have revealed voluntarily. But they only seemed to encourage Emma, who had an entirely too cocky smirk on her face, and that motivated Regina to clear her head enough so that she could grab Emma’s hips and roll them over so that she was on top.

Emma pouted.

Regina laughed, a high, pleased, wicked sound that made Emma groan and yes, that was more like it, so Regina rewarded her with a peck on the lips before descending down to explore all the parts of her she hadn’t yet seen.

She tapped the top of Emma’s shirt, and Emma raced to remove it, revealing her breasts, strained and perky and smaller than her own but so, so pretty, the nipples so, so swollen and dark pink, and Regina needed to be touching them now, so she squeezed with her hands and closed her lips around the tip and sucked, hard, making Emma moan out something that resembled her name, and Regina was determined to produce that noise as many times that night as she possibly could, so she stayed on that breast for a while, enjoying the sweet-salty, velvet-soft feel of Emma’s skin under her tongue.

She gave one final kitten-lick to the first nipple and then switched to the other, and Emma huffed but it wasn’t quite right, so while Regina worked on that breast she crept her hand down Emma’s stomach and found the rim of her pants.

There were two buttons there, and her head was so cloudy she growled in frustration, and it took a few moments and some maneuvering of her wrist between their bodies, but finally the buttons popped and released.

They were both breathing hard when Emma sat up to wiggle the fabric down her thighs. Regina scooted down to straddle her legs and help her pull them the rest of the way; Emma kicked them loose with her feet and Regina was almost afraid to look, afraid she would get lost there, in the very center of her, and be consumed. But Emma tugged her hand with a pleading expression and Regina couldn’t bear to wait, not really. She tongued around Emma’s belly button first, running her hands from her torso all the way down the sides of Emma’s thighs, silky skin and soft hairs and tensed muscle beneath, then followed the v of her waist to the patch of course yellow hair, slightly darker than the shade on top of Emma’s head.

The smell there was musky and dark. Regina had only ever gotten that smell second-hand on her own fingers after touching her body in the dark, but this was so much richer, and the sex-smell made her head spin.

She didn’t know where to touch first; she knew where she wanted to touch first, but didn’t know if that was right. But judging by the glassy look in Emma’s eyes it didn’t really matter where she started, as long as she did it now, and that was easy enough, so she nosed in Emma’s curls and just inhaled. Her breath alone seemed enough stimulation, because Emma’s hands shot down to Regina’s hair and squeezed, as if they were unable to help themselves.

Regina shushed her and followed the trail of hair, down to her vulva; she cast one quick glance at Emma, who nodded and babbled some incoherent plea at her. Regina ran her tongue across her own lips, thinking for a second of a cat licking cream from its whiskers.

She peeled back of the petals of Emma’s lower lips, revealing the pink, pulsing inner skin. It slicked in the mild lamp-glow, and a drop of wetness trailed down between her buttocks. Regina swallowed, throat dry.

“’Giiiina,” Emma pleaded, and Regina’s toes curled to hear Emma so needy she couldn’t even pronounce her full name.

She swiped up the middle of Emma’s vulva with her tongue. The hips beneath her jerked, but Regina steadied them with her hands on Emma’s thighs. Then, with her nose pressed just above Emma’s button, she buried her tongue in her core, moaning at the sudden and unexpected taste, the stickiness that immediately coated her lips and around her mouth.

She pistoned her tongue down and out a few times, just to see what would happen, and though Emma’s hips jutted, it was not quite the response she wanted. So she decided to finally stop torturing and nuzzled up so that her nose was pressed to the crease of Emma’s thigh, then flashed out her tongue to lick once, twice, quick, quick, quick, over Emma’s clit.

Emma thrust up at the same time that she stuffed a fist in her mouth to muffle her groan, and Regina had to stop to let the shudder go through her own body at the pleasure of it. She immediately missed it, missed the warmth and the slick and the taste, so she lowered her head back between her legs and sucked the swollen clit out completely from its hood, then flicked it back and forth and back and forth, trying to find the place, the rhythm, just above and just below, but never quite concentrating all the pressure directly on that most sensitive spot.

She hadn’t quite found the pressure and place that Emma needed, but she wanted to explore a little bit longer, because she could feel Emma’s core pulsing against her chin, knew she was close, and she wasn’t ready to be done.

Questing, she slithered her hand from Emma’s thigh, down under her own chin and up the stripe of skin between Emma’s ass and vagina, gathering up the trail of wetness that had streaked down. She collected it on the pad of her fingers and rubbed all around the ridged skin around Emma’s entrance, and Emma’s hips, no longer restrained, began to pump up lightly in a stuttering rhythm.

Regina’s fingers dipped in as her tongue continued to lash against Emma’s clit and that changed everything, because her inner walls were cloying and thick and clung to her fingers as she withdrew them, and Regina moaned and felt herself clench, and noticed for the first time that she was pumping too, up and down ever so slightly with her own hips against the bed.

She shifted her fingers around, feeling all the hard, silky ridges of Emma’s vagina and searching, searching for the soft, squishy spot and——there, and Emma’s hips lifted off the bed and she whimpered, biting her lip to keep herself from being louder than that, and Regina wanted to tell her to stop holding it, but then she remembered who Emma was trying to be quiet for, so that was alright, she supposed, even though she really, really wanted to hear the full range of sounds Emma was capable of.

Finally she found the spot, the exact right spot that she flicked and lashed and rubbed with her tongue until finally she fell into a rhythm and Emma’s hips weren’t stopping, they met her fingers’ downstrokes, and then the pads of her fingers rubbed up against the soft, spongy place she’d been looking for, and she rubbed and rubbed until her fingers burned and sucked Emma’s clit between her lips and flicked the spot to the side of her clit, and pressed down hard with all of her body. And Emma’s body was meeting her and Regina thought she’d die right there, trapped forever in the only infinity she would ever want.

Emma froze…her hips kicked up off the bed and her walls clenched and clung and squeezed Regina’s fingers, and she felt wetness leaking on her palm. She stroked her all the way through it. She made it keep going a couple of times, when it seemed like Emma was done, she pressed in just such a way that Emma’s body stuttered and clenched one more time, and she wished and wished and wished that it would never end.

((()))

Emma would go with the queen.

There was no debate about that, although Emma hadn’t been given much of a say in the matter.

But she could see, even when she looked at Regina, that it was expected of her.

Regina came back to her bed for the next three nights. She slipped under the blankets with Emma and Henry, cradling both of them on either side, and read a story in her smooth cadence, then one of them would send a sleepy Henry off to his own room, and the the rest of the night would be theirs. The routine was achingly domestic and easy and right, and Emma hated that they had only now just fallen into it. All the weeks they’d wasted, distrusting and bickering and skirting around each other.

A few years ago, if someone had told her she was some long-lost princess, with a castle and a kingdom and a mother and father who had spent the long decades searching for her…well, she would have believed it even less than she did now, but she wouldn’t have cared enough to question it, too grateful for a soft bed and guaranteed meals, and blazing hearths during the cold season.

But in the intervening years something had happened.

She’d stopped wishing that she could live some other life, or be some other person.

When Granny cuffed her chin affectionately for being foolish or forgetful, when Red teased and pulled her hair and passed off chores when Granny was out of earshot, when Henry smiled his gummy smile and begged to play outside…she’d come not to mind, so much, inhabiting this body and this space.

When Regina touched her like she was something precious…something to be held and cherished and not just taken for pleasure…

Emma found herself hyperventilating at the window of the bedroom that was no longer hers.

Their meager things had been emptied out, and few clothes had been kept, for Snow White insisted they’d both be getting much nicer wardrobes when they returned to the capitol.

Emma hoped that wasn’t code for no more trousers.

She leaned her forehead on the windowpane and gulped air that refused to fill her lungs.

Below her was the view of town——home, this was home, the only one she’d ever known, and she had only just begun to like it there. She could see the roof of Granny’s tavern in the square, a crowd blocking the roads in an effort to get a glimpse of the queen’s entourage on the other side of the river. The edge of the forest where Red and Henry had gone for long morning walks when he was a baby, before he got sick. The thinning trees that branched out around a field of flowers where children played.

Emma had gotten stung there once, by a bee. It had landed on Henry’s head, and sniped her instead, when she swatted it off of him. Red had laughed so hard she cried when Emma moped through the front door with her thumb swelled up like a cherry.

“Emma.”

Regina, at the door.

She didn’t knock anymore. Those sorts of barriers seemed silly now, and had fallen from between them.

Her heels tapped across the floor to Emma’s side, and then arms were around her. Emma hid her face and tried to pace her breathing with the other woman’s.

Regina seemed to realize what she was trying to do, because she took slow, exaggerated breaths for Emma to follow along. She rocked them back and forth like Emma had seen her do to calm Henry.

A rap came on the door.

“Who is it?” Regina called irritably. Emma didn’t look up. Didn’t want to see, didn’t care. She could smell Regina’s perfume.

The door opened and a young male voice said, “Er, ‘scuse me, miss, Her Majesty sends her summons. The horses are almost prepared.”

“Her Majesty will just have to wait,” Regina said.

“But, miss, they want to be off before sundown, you see——”

“The princess isn’t ready,” Regina grit, and Emma knew what it cost her to say that word.

Princess.

She usually avoided saying it, because she knew how much Emma hated hearing it.

But that word held power, because every time it was used, the world bended to her will.

The page-boy stuttered his apologies and carried Regina’s message off to the queen.

Desperation coiled in Emma’s chest.

“I feel sick,” she whispered.

“It’s just the nerves, darling. You’ll feel better once you’re on the road.”

Emma shook her head against Regina’s shoulder.

“You will,” Regina promised. She pressed her lips to the side of Emma’s head and left them there. Not so much a kiss as a reassurance of her presence. “Think of all the things you’ll see,” she whispered.

“I don’t want to see anything,” came Emma’s muffled voice.

She sounded rather like Henry when he was tired and cranky.

“Emma.” Regina extricated herself, much to Emma’s chagrin. “The whole world is waiting for you.” She smiled, her eyes creased sadly but her words full of assurance and love.

Emma didn’t want the whole world. She never had. She had only wanted a very small piece of it, where maybe there were some people that she belonged to, and that belonged to her. Not a whole city. Certainly not an entire kingdom.

Was one small piece too much to ask for?

“It’s just…I just started to think,” she whispered. “That…maybe…”

And couldn’t finish.

Regina cradled her face; Emma nestled her cheek against the long, familiar fingers.

“I know, darling.” Regina’s voice caught, and she had to close her eyes and take a shuddering breath.

Emma tilted her head to press their lips together, and the contact was immediately soothing to them both.

They were just about to let themselves fall into the embrace when a second messenger opened the door without knocking. “Your Highness, the queen really does request——”

Regina whirled on the man. “Get. Out.”

“Now, really,” the man protested.

Purple flames sparked at the tips of Regina’s fingers. She snarled, “I swear on the queen herself, the next person who interrupts the princess before she’s ready, I will drag to my dungeon, string up by their wrists, stick every inch of their skin with needles and leave dangling there for a week.”

The man paled.

“Out.”

He took his time, muttering to himself. Something like, the queen will hear about this.

“Tell her and see what happens,” Regina snapped, and the man yelped as a flash of purple magic pursued him out the door.

Regina turned to Emma with a satisfied expression. “Well, that was fun. Maybe I should let strangers in more often.”

“You wouldn’t really——do what you said, would you?”

Regina winked as she brought her arms back around Emma. “Well, probably not. But he doesn’t have to know that.”

Then she sobered. “Here.” From a hidden compartment in her dress she procured a glass vial. “For Henry. That’s the last of the batch.”

The vial fit neatly in Emma’s hands, and would barely last the journey to the Enchanted Forest.

“Can’t you just fix him?” she asked, staring at the swirling bluish-green liquid.

Regina bit her lip. “Emma…we talked about this.”

“You told me he was sick,” Emma muttered. “I already knew that.”

“Emma, it’s better this way. There’ll be a whole host of wizards in the Enchanted Forest falling over themselves to help him, cure him. Maybe they’ll find something I couldn’t.”

“He’s better,” Emma croaked. “He looks and acts so much better. Are you sure——”

Regina crooked a knuckle under Emma’s chin. “You know I am.”

Emma shrugged her off.

“Emma…”

“I don’t think you should touch me anymore,” Emma breathed.

“What?”

“It’ll just hurt too much.”

“Don’t do this.”

“There’s nothing to do. We’ll be gone in the hour.”

Gone, they were. Henry clung first to Red, then to Regina in the courtyard, but Emma couldn’t face either of them. Red promised there would be letters and visits.

Emma frowned. “Shape-shifters aren’t…”

“The queen granted me special permission,” Red said quickly. “And also…well…I thought, now that you’re royal…”

Emma, through the fog of her misery, didn’t understand.

Red grabbed her hands. “Come on, Em,” she whispered. “You have power now. You can change things. You can tear down the border and then I could come and see you whenever I wanted. Maybe I could even come and live with you.”

Emma perked up. “Would you?”

“If you can change the law,” Red said. “Then nothing would stop me.”

It hadn’t occurred to Emma before that moment. She opened her mouth and stared at her friend.

For Emma, wealth and royalty had always signified warmth and comfort and the luxuries of a full stomach and clean clothes. She had never considered the power she might have beyond that.

Red nodded, smiling and squeezing her hands. “See?”

At the open door of the waiting carriage, Regina embraced Henry. Emma watched from a distance. Regina’s eyes swept the courtyard, landing on every one of the queen’s guards and footmen. The message was clear; Henry was hers to have and protect. She claimed him. If harm came to a single hair on his head, she would know, and there would be consequences.

Then Henry was bundled in the carriage and it was only Emma left, alone, standing in the middle of the cobblestone courtyard.

She and Regina were suddenly the only people left in the whole world.

Emma felt the aching loss of having come so close to something, something she didn’t know how to identify and couldn’t put a name to.

Regina stood stone-still and they just looked at each other, neither of them moving until a polite cough came from the interior of the carriage.

Emma winced.

Regina tried to smile, but it only made her look morose. She gestured with her head. The queen was waiting, in her elegant, ornate gilded carriage pulled by four chestnut horses. Their coloring was solid except for the various patches of white on their hocks and foreheads. Regina broke Emma’s gaze and patted the nose of the giant beast nearest to her. It grunted and pushed its nose into her hand. Then Regina patted its neck and stepped back, crossing her arms and nodding to the driver. Her chest shuddered. Emma, watching every minute movement of her body, saw the way her chin trembled and her eyes glinted in the setting sun.

She longed to go to her, but that would only make it hurt more, later. Hard-knocked Emma had learned that lesson a long time ago. Clean breaks were better, in the end. More painful in the moment, but quicker to heal.

So she entered the carriage and closed the door with her arms cold and empty, with not even the ghost of Regina’s embrace wrapped around her.

The carriage jolted and the horses set off at a swift gallop.

“Ma!” Henry latched onto her forearm in alarm.

“It’s alright, Henry,” Emma said.

“The faster the horses move, the faster we’ll reach home,” Snow said with a smile.

Henry looked at Emma. “G’anny?”

Emma shook her head. “That’s not home anymore, Hen.”

Henry looked confused at first. He frowned between Snow and Emma. “G’anny cookies?” he said.

Emma choked.

“Maybe…er, ‘Gammy’ can visit you in your new castle,” Snow said. “Wouldn’t you like that?”

“Granny,” Emma muttered.

Henry’s soft hair blew like a feather on Emma’s skin as he leaned his head on her shoulder. “’Gina castle.”

“No,” Emma groaned. “We don’t live there anymore.”

Emma and Regina had tried and tried to explain it to him, but his world was only so big, only contained so many spaces. His reality was Granny and Red and Emma and Regina, but now only Emma was left, and she was carting him off to a strange new land with no warning or explanation that he would be able to understand.

It wasn’t fair. Emma wished, in a distant, out-of-body sort of way, that she could fling herself out the window and run howling back to the looming, gray tower that was slowly receding farther and farther into the distance. If she was a princess now…if she had power, as Red had insinuated…then she should have been allowed to choose for herself.

She’d never thought about having choices before because she’d never had any. She let life spin her up and around and back again, and landed where it dropped her and made the best of it. But now the numbness was gone, whatever remnants of apathy that accompanied Henry’s birth had been crushed, by this overwhelming feeling of want in her chest, of wanting so badly it ached.

She couldn’t look at the queen who kept trying to meet her gaze, always with a hopeful smile ready on her lips. Emma didnt know what she expected. Some joyful reunion? She already had a family. She already had a life, and it hadn’t come cheap. All this woman was doing was taking it away from her.

The procession snaked along the road and crossed single file over the bridge that would carry them out of town. The sun had already passed its zenith, and the caravan

Emma was thinking of those final moments in the courtyard. She should have gone to Regina. No matter what pain it cost them, she should have demanded another embrace, one last kiss, and be damned whoever saw.

“Emma?”

She blinked. “What?”

Snow shifted, tucking a piece of hair behind her ears, eyes darting back and forth. “I was speaking to you.”

“Oh.”

Snow White perched on her seat like a little bird, hoping for crumbs.

Emma sighed. “What?”

“Well, I was just saying that, I know this is all such a shock to you still. It’s a shock to me, too.” Her dark hair had streaks of gray in it. Her eyes were bright and shining with tears. “I’m a stranger to you, I know, but…I’ve loved you all your life. Won’t it…wont it be easier if we face whatever comes next…together?”

Outside, a bugle sounded and the caravan came to a halt. Relieved, Emma’s hand shot to the door, but Snow White stopped her. “The guards will set up our tents first, so we don’t have to stand in the cold for longer than we need to.”

Emma could find no compelling reason to protest, and so she stayed trapped inside the carriage with her once-mother, who was still looking at her expectantly, like she was waiting for Emma to give her…something. Emma wished she knew what it was so she could give it to her and be done with it, and be able to stop staring into those wistful, melancholy eyes and feeling guilty, like she’d done something wrong when she hadn’t done anything at all.

((()))

She woke to the sound of coughing——a familiar, dreaded sound that she hadn’t heard in many weeks. She rolled over on the cot she shared with Henry and shook her son into wakefulness. She helped him sit up and patted his back in a rhythm that Regina had showed her, a steady 1, 2, 3, 4, that Henry could follow with his breathing.

Eventually Henry leaned exhaustedly against her.

“Wait here.”

Henry whimpered as she left him alone on the cot, but she returned quickly with her satchel, from which she procured the precious glass vial Regina had given to her. She spooned out a mouthful and Henry swallowed it dutifully.

Emma crossed her legs and pulled him into her lap, where he nuzzled against the front of her shirt. She listened for the moment that the potion set in and his breathing eased, becoming less raspy and strained.

Finally, she laid him back on his side and scooted in behind him, wrapping her arm around his body and pulling him close. He mumbled nonsensical toddler words. He seemed to be talking to her, and she grunted in response.

Then he said a word she did know.

“’Gina.”

Her stomach dropped. “It’s just us, Hen.”

“Wan’ ‘Gina.”

“Henry…”

He began to cry, and Emma felt a swelling in her throat. She rolled over onto her back and arranged him on top of her, a position that Red had discovered that he found soothing. He fisted the fabric of her shirt and she felt the stickiness of tears on her collarbone.

There was nothing she could do. This wasn’t something she could fix. She could only let him cry it out and wish she could cry too, expel the feeling of dread in her gut and maybe, hopefully, grow blissfully numb.

“I want her too.”


	12. Chapter Twelve

Snow White looked apologetic as they drove through the gates of the city, and soon Emma saw why; the streets were alive with celebration, and the attention of the denizens was focused entirely on her. They knew who she was. She closed the curtain over the carriage window and tried not to hyperventilate. Henry was fascinated by the commotion. He had never seen so many people in one place.

They reached the gates of the palace, and once the horses pulled into the inner courtyard, the noise died down. They were greeted by a footman who kissed her hand as she descended the steps of the carriage. She discreetly wiped the feel of his lips off on the back of her pants.

The king waited for them with a boy, Seth, who looked to be only a few years older than Henry. He held himself with all the regal bearing of a boy who had been born and raised a prince.

The king took her arm and said, “Rosemary. At long last.” He pressed his lips to her temple. His face held poise and charm. “How we’ve missed you.” He squeezed her shoulders and appraised her; she saw him note the trousers and man’s shirt, but he showed no outward sign of disapproval.

Then he turned to greet his wife, and she heard Snow White say, “Emma. Her name is Emma now, David.”

Seth examined Henry, who blinked at him with owlish eyes. Emma realized he had never beheld another child in such finery. Seth had the brown hair to match his mother, but his father’s good-natured face. He didn’t know what to make of Henry either, and the boys just stared at each other until Snow White approached.

“Mother,” Seth said.

Snow White held his cheeks and kissed his forehead. “My darling boy,” she said. “Have you met Henry?”

“Greetings, Henry,” Seth said. His high-born accent sounded unnatural coming from the body of a child. “How do you do.”

Henry clutched Emma’s leg and stuck his thumb in his mouth. “Hullo,” he mumbled around it.

Emma squeezed his shoulder. “It’s been a long journey,” she said.

“Oh, you must be exhausted!” Snow White beckoned the footman. “Have Emma’s things brought to the east corridor, the lilac room. She’ll stay in the guest quarters until we can have permanent rooms arranged.” She looked at her husband. “Oh, and Henry will need a governess right away, and Emma a wardrobe…”

And so on.

((()))

  
“How nice,” Snow White said as Emma unpacked the trunk of her meager things.

She turned to see what Snow White was talking about.

In her hands was a bundle of white wildflowers.

“I wonder who sent them,” Snow White said.

They sat atop Emma’s satchel, on a table covered in several tiaras of varying styles; Snow White intended to present her to the court that evening. “We can’t keep them waiting,” she’d said, when Emma pleaded for more time, or, really, any time at all, to adjust to this new world. “You’re a princess, you have a duty to your subjects.”

“They’re mine!” Emma said, leaping across the room and snatching the bundle from Snow White’s surprised hands.

“Well, of course they’re yours, sweetheart, they were sent to your room.”

Emma grimaced. Snow White was experimenting with pet names, all equally horrible, stiff and unnatural.

She stroked the petals.

“Although why they would send wildflowers…” Snow White said.

“I like them,” Emma said.

Snow White sighed. “Well, I’ll have someone brink up a vase of water, would you like that?”

Henry popped his head out of the closet, which was as big as his room back home. Back in what had been their home. “’Gina!” he said, pointing at the flowers.

Emma placed the bundle back on the vanity and picked Henry up before Snow White could understand the connection he was making.

How Snow White didn’t see the glowing red magic twisting through the veins of each stem was a mystery to her. Maybe a part of the spell that Regina had infused them with. She didn’t know how they’d gotten there, but the message was clear; from a realm away, Regina was asking for her help.

((()))

Whispers abounded in court of an unusual and high-profile prisoner.

Emma disliked most everything about court, except that sometimes she overheard valuable information. Mostly it was nonsense, frivolous gossip that entertained and pacified the nobility. But Snow White and her advisers didn’t trust Emma yet with the politics that happened behind closed doors, so it was her only access to the inner workings of the palace

Finally, she heard a name: the Dark One.

((()))

The afternoon brought lazy sunshine down upon Henry while he napped, after a full morning of fittings for their new wardrobes and an impromptu lesson from Seth in the art of sword-fighting. Seth had taken to Henry a bit more than Henry had taken to him.

Henry didn’t have much experience with other children, having been bedridden for the last year of his life. The ones he was used to were the dirty ragamuffin crews that ran in town.

Seth seemed just as bewildered, but much more charmed at the idea of having a little boy around for him to impress. Emma wondered how many actual children he’d met in his life, and how often he was cooped up in the palace acting the part of the prince.

No one disturbed them during these lazy afternoons, and for that Emma was grateful. She could sit at the window and memorize the silhouette of the city, enjoy the sun on her face, bask in the silence. There was so much noise here. Even at night, it never felt like the city truly settled. Nothing was ever still. Everything was new. There was an immense amount of stimuli always rushing at her. She missed the quiet coolness of the forests back home.

Not home.

Emma wasn’t sure what the nature of home even meant anymore. As a child, home had meant family. A mother and father to love and hold and treasure her. She was quickly disillusioned of that fantasy, and home was just a name for the streets where she lived, the rooftops she slept on, the taverns where she teased drunken men. Then, Red and Granny had softened the edges of her world and made her understand a version of home that invited warmth and affection. Not a family like the one she’d imagined as a little girl, but better, somehow, because it was hers. And they were inevitably tied to the tavern, so that was part of home too.

Regina’s castle wasn’t a home at all.

She didn’t know what Regina was. Could a person be a home? Could you curl up inside someone’s ribcage and be cradled there like a chair by the hearth?

Henry snuffled in his sleep and she checked his temperature, which was normal, so she felt reasonably assured in leaving him for a short time. She tucked the blankets securely around his little body, and fluffed the pillows by his head.

Emma wished she could bring him, because she needed strength right now and he was all she had. She kissed his forehead and tucked the blanket to his chin, and hummed a song that Regina had sung to him, one that made him flutter open his eyes and say, “I wanna go home.” She shushed him and sang until he settled and fell asleep.

“I’ll be right back,” she whispered.

The track down to the dungeons was in a guarded section of the palace, nowhere near the main halls and parlors that Emma had seen. It was so much vaster here in than in Regina’s castle, and so much easier to get caught by an errant guard or noble who’d recognize her and want to strike up a conversation, to be able to say to someone back home, “I saw her…the lost princess.”

The dungeon had a single entrance at the end of a long corridor. Emma had been ready to wheedle her way past the guards, or else survey the place for an alternate way in, but when they saw her they snapped to attention and addressed her as Highness. And then it was really nothing at all to get them to unlock the door for her and give her the key, so that she could let herself back out again.

Emma wasn’t used to just being let into places, least of all royal prisons, but she was good at pretending she belonged in spaces where she technically didn’t. The guards were all too eager to do her bidding; she didn’t even have to explain herself.

As soon as the door closed behind her she was cast in darkness. She swallowed and fingered the key in her pocket to assure herself that it was there. The guards had told her where to find the oil lamp at the top of the stairs; she patted along the wall until her hand collided with the cool iron.

The passage flickered into sight as soon as the lamp was alight. The projection of light only extended a few feet in front of her, but it was enough for her to descend the spiraling staircase without fear of falling. The walls grew damp against her hand as went deeper. The air was cool but thin, and she shivered in her loose shirt and trousers.

Her steps echoed; then she began to hear movement that was not her own. The shuffle of footsteps, the rattle of ball and chain, whispering, frantic murmurs as the prisoners tried to determine who had come.

She stopped at the first door. “Hey,” she said.

“What?” a bodiless voice rasped.

“Where can I find the man known as the Dark One?”

“You don’t want anything to do with him, missy.”

A face appeared at the bars and surveyed her.

“Ai. What’s a pretty thing like you want with the Dark One, anyway?”

“It doesn’t matter. Is he here?”

The prisoner pretended to think. “Well, let’s see now. I seem to remember…something…if only I recall…”

Emma huffed and waved him away. She wasn’t here to play games. She’d find him herself.

By now, the murmurings were louder as word passed on that a stranger had come among them.

A pretty stranger.

Emma ignored the leers and whistles.

There was only one door where no one had come to see her.

“Is this him?” she demanded of the others. When they saw who she meant, they shrank back into the shadows of their cells.

“Well, look who it is.”

She knew that voice. She had heard it before, in Regina’s castle. Regina had protected her, then.

“I had a feeling I’d be seeing you.”

Emma pressed her face right up to the door. “Why didn’t you tell me the truth?”

“Does anyone ever really know the truth?”

“Don’t. Don’t play games with me.”

“I assure you, I’m deadly serious. The nature of truth is a slippery thing. For example, is it, or is it not, the truth that you are in love with Regina Mills?”

“Don’t change the subject!”

“Ahh.” The Dark One’s glittering green eyes scanned her face. “So you are, then.”

“That’s not why I’m here,” Emma grit.

“But it is true.”

“I don’t know what’s true!”

“So you admit, the nature of truth is ambiguous?”

“Stop talking in circles!” She grabbed the bars of the cell. “I’m a princess now. I could have you…I don’t know, beheaded. Or hanged.”

The Dark One chuckled. “You can’t get rid of me so easily, dearie.”

“Watch me.”

“You were always so feisty. It took both Cora and myself to subdue you.”

“I’ve never even met Cora.”

“When you were a child.”

“I don’t remember you from back then.”

“You don’t remember anything from before you were five years old, dearie, we made sure of that.”

“What?”

“You were owed to me,” the Dark One said. Your mother tried to cheat me of my price, after everything I did for her!”

“I don’t…I don’t understand…”

The Dark One snorted. “She didn’t tell you, did she?”

“Tell me…?”

“She sold you,” the Dark One said.

Suddenly, Regina’s story from many weeks ago came flooding back. It all felt so disconnected from herself that she’d forgotten the tale of Rosemary the princess and her unknown fate.

“To save the kingdom, she sold you. Her firstborn child. In return, I gave her power to overthrow that tyrannical father of hers. You don’t know your history, do you, dearie? But then, I suppose you can’t be blamed for that.”

Emma’s chest was all in knots. She wiped furiously at her eyes, where tears perched unbidden.

“What did you do to me?” she whispered.

“It’s not what I did to you. You humans always blame your tragedies on me, but I am only the means to an end. Like a channel or a tool. They are the ones who use me, come to me and strike their bargains and make their promises, for power or love or freedom. I can’t help it that they choose unwisely.”

There was a loud clatter, as if of metal, somewhere above them.

Emma looked up.

“We’re running out of time,” the Dark One said. “Listen to me. Very soon Regina will try to break out of her cage.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I know her, though she’d like to think I don’t. With you gone, there’s no reason for her to stay, and I can’t say for sure what will happen when she does, but I know this: she will come for me and her mother. She cannot beat us both. We will eliminate her if we have to, if we can’t make her see reason. However.” He held up a finger. “Emma, you may be the only one who can stop her from destroying herself.”

Emma knew when she was being played.

“I’m not interested in your twisted little games, thanks.”

“I told you, princess.” The Dark One slithered closer to the metal bars. “This is no game. She seeks revenge and I will not go willingly. But maybe, if you ask, she will pause before the slaughter.”

“Why should I stop her from slaughtering a monster?”

The Dark One laughed. “A clever one, aren’t you? But haven’t you been listening? Regina is strong, yes. The most talented little apprentice I’ve ever received. But she is incapable of severing ties with her own emotions. She will be full of anger and resentment and hurt. She will feel abandoned. And because of this, she will make a mistake. Expose a vulnerability without meaning to. That is when we will strike. We will tear her to pieces, and scatter the remains on the wind, until not even true love could put her back together again.”

“She’s stronger than you think.”

“Are you willing to bet her life on that?”

Voices emerged from the stairwell leading back up to the palace. There was the clank of armor and a female voice calling orders.

“Your mother comes for you. Afraid I’ll tell you too much.” He put a finger to his lips. “Oh, one more thing.”

He snapped his fingers.

All at once light flooded through Emma. She gasped and fell against the door. An enormous pressure rushed through her, bearing down upon her chest, centering in the place where her heart was, before she jolted forward and hit her head on the cell bars. The Dark One stuck his finger through and touched her chest, and suddenly the pressure was funneling out of her, a sort of vomiting sensation, though nothing real came out of her, except a foamy swirl of black magic, pulled like a strand from her body by the Dark One, and dissipating in the air.

Emma, sweating and gasping, didn’t have the wherewithal to move away from the Dark One’s finger.

“You’ll be a bit lightheaded for a few days, dearie, careful. And you’re welcome.”

“For…what?”

“I just removed the block on your magic Cora and I placed there. He twisted his head and blinked ghoulishly. “You’re welcome.”

Then he muttered several guttural phrases and vanished in a flash of indigo smoke.

Emma collapsed on the ground, where Snow White found her. A guard peered into the cell and shouted when he saw the empty block.

——

Emma was bedridden for a day and a night, Henry by her side for all of it while she became accustomed to the presence of this new force inside of her.

“Well, of course,” Snow White said when she came to her bed and Emma explained what had happened. “You’re the child of true love. That’s the most powerful magic there is. When you were a baby, there were signs of it.”

“A baby that you sold,” Emma muttered.

Snow White developed a pained expression. “Rosema—Emma. It was the only way. The only price he would accept. My father…he was an evil man. I had no choice. We always planned to get out of it—defeat the Dark One somehow. Outwit him.”

“You don’t break deals with the Dark One,” Emma said. Regina had told her that.

“We didn’t know this would happened,” Snow White whispered.

“You shouldn’t have done it in the first place.”

“I loved you the moment I saw you. I’ve loved you for all these years.”

Emma turned away. She ran her fingers through Henry’s hair, growing loose and curly around his ears. She didn’t respond. What she wanted to say was, _What good does love do me now?_

That night, the Dark One appeared in her dreams. His face morphed into Regina’s and she woke up in a sweat. Henry was moaning beside her. His face was feverish and hot. She grasped for the vial in the bedside table but there were only a few drops left. She administered them to him and kept vigil until his fever broke sometime in the early morning hours.

All of the royal family’s best wizards had come up empty. No one could figure out what was wrong with him, though they all agreed a nefarious, dark magic was poisoning him from the inside. They weren’t even able to determine the ingredients in Regina’s elixir to replicate it. It was a very sophisticated potion, they all nodded in scholarly agreement. They were useless.

She dozed off around dawn and Regina’s face returned to her dreams. She was regal and composed as ever, but there was a fire in her eyes, an anger as deep as the night.

This time when Emma awoke, she thought of what the Dark One had said.

She remembered a conversation early on with Regina. She was capable of escaping, Regina had said, she was strong enough. But if she did, she wouldn’t be able to stop herself from seeking revenge. She’d known that although they might destroy her in the end, she would take them down with her. And she would be vindicated, that in her death she at least had done some good.

The Dark One was crazy, but what he’d said made sense. If Emma asked Regina to stand down, she just might listen.

Hadn’t they been intended? Was the betrothal broken, just because she hadn’t been around to fulfill it? That had been through no fault of her own.

She had a vision of Regina here in the palace and had to smile at how out of place she looked in her sleek black gowns and piercing eyes, in a court full of pastel-clothed fops and fools.

There had been talk of succession from the moment Emma came back. She could abscond the throne, which was still technically hers, as first born. Seth was more suited to it; monarchy ran through his blood, in his mannerism, the way he carried himself. He was a prince. Emma was no princess, no matter who her parents were.

There was Henry too consider. One day he might want to be a prince, when he was old enough to understand. Would he want to be a prince? She watched his slumbering form. She could imagine him as a prince, but so too could she imagine him as an adventurer, a huntsman or sailor or horse tamer. He was so young, he could be anything. Was it fair to make that choice for him?

In the end she lay in the dimness of dawn, unsettled and unresolved, aching for whatever home was supposed to be.

((()))

The Dark One returned to the Keep during the third week of Emma’s absence.

For once, Regina was grateful to see him. The castle was desperately hollow.

“Where’ve you been?” she said. “Don’t bother lying. I already know you were playing prisoner to Snow White.”

The Dark One grinned, his teeth glinting. “You have to let them think they have an advantage sometimes, otherwise they get discouraged and stop trying. I do so enjoy a challenge, you know.”

“You knew,” Regina said.

“You’ll have to be more specific dearie.”

“Don’t play dumb with me, I’m not one of your human playthings.”

“Oh, but you are so very human. Gullible and soft. Your mother was never this emotional.”

“My mother doesn’t have a heart.”

“Literally.” The Dark One giggled.

“Enough. Why didn’t you tell me who Emma truly was?”

“This way is so much more fun.”

“No. That’s not good enough.”

“You’re no fun.” The Dark One sighed. “Think about it; would you have still fallen in love with her if you knew who she was?”

“What does that have to do with anything? And I’m not in love with her.”

“Suit yourself.” The Dark One hopped on the banister and lounged there, feet dangling.

“Wait,” Regina said with a dawning horror. “Did you want me to fall in love with her?”

The Dark One’s chapped, scaly mouth curled into a grin.

“Look, whatever convoluted scheme—”

“It’s simple, really. Not convoluted at all. Now I can set you free.”

“Excuse me?”

The Dark One rolled over on his belly. “Do you think I’m stupid, Regina?”

Yes. “No.”

“Never mind. We both know why I couldn’t let you go. You’d pursue your little revenge quest till the end of time. Taking you down would be so tiresome. Doable, of course, but far too much work.”

“Oh yes, it’s much more fun to take advantage of people who can’t fight back.”

“Precisely.” He jumped off the banister. “So I think to myself…how to get rid of you, then? Killing you would be too much trouble, and honestly, dearie, I don’t know if I could. You’re stronger even than your mother, though she had the far better temperament for magic. Cold and calculating. You care too much. It’s not good for you. Not good for your magic. Magic that cares gets out of control.”

Regina hated him.

“Ironically enough, it was your mother who presented me with the solution.”

“You dragged her into this?”

“Well, she’s a part of it, isn’t she? You want revenge on her even more than you want it on me. She was the one who sold you.”

“She wanted an education for me…the best—”

“Still living in that little fantasy?” The Dark One circled her. “No, Regina, she wanted a tool. You, of course, turned out to be a great disappointment to both of us.”

“Do you want me to kill you?”

“I want you to appreciate the gift we gave you!”

Regina waved her arms around. “What gift? An empty castle? A pointless power?”

“True love!”

The Dark One grinned triumphantly when that finally got her to stop talking.

“Your mother thought, what poetic justice if we returned to you the thing you’d lost? And then there was that little business with those hearts—don’t think I didn’t notice that, dearie—and it was just too convenient. Emma Swan needed someone powerful to save her son, and we thought that would be enough to bring you together, but you really made devising a meet-cute laughably simple. Almost took out all the fun.

“I knew Emma Swan would come in handy eventually. I could have done a hundred delicious things with her, but I thought, why not set her aside, keep her around for a rainy day? And clearly, she’s more than proved her worth.”

“You forced us together?”

“No, not at all, dearie.”

“Did you—make her fall in love with me?”

The Dark One held up his hands in innocence. “I considered it, but no no, you lovely little children did that all on your own. So listen to this. I will go back to the Enchanted Forest and I will convince the queen that you had nothing to do with her precious daughter’s disappearance.”

“I didn’t have anything to do with her disappearance.”

“But you’ll never make her believe that. You’re too easy of a scapegoat. She can justify it all sorts of way in her head, I’m sure, even if Emma insists that you’re an innocent party. She was tricked, she was fooled, she was blinded by love. There will always be some reason that she’s lying. Because now she’s free of you, too, and Snow White can marry her daughter off to a nice, noble prince with no dark or affiliations to me. But! But. If you’d like, I can whisper in her ear, a little something. And then. Boom! Before you know it, you’ll be out of this dusty old ruin and off to marry your beloved, the way it was intended. Snow White will be quite taken with the romanticism of it all.”

“And what do you want?” she asked. “In return.”

“For you not to try to kill me, of course.”

“Just let you off the hook?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that. I’ve lost two valuable investments.”

What about my mother?”

“Do what you want with Cora.”

“Wait,” she said. There were still so many questions.

He sighed. “What is it now?”

“Henry…did you make Henry sick?”

He tilted his head. “Oh no, that wasn’t me, dearie. Even I have certain limits.”

“Can you help him?”

“The only thing to do now is let the illness run its course.”

Regina gritted her teeth to keep from strangling him. “And where exactly is it running to?”

The Dark One gave her a meaningful look. “Don’t make me say it.”

Regina closed her eyes.

And flashed them open. “No. No. There has to be a way.”

The Dark One tapped his chin. “I suppose there is one way.”

“No more contracts,” Regina said.

“It wouldn’t work anyway. There’s nothing I can give you, and nothing that I want. However, what you can do is confront the person who cast the curse.”

Regina knew even before he said it. Her whole body tightened against it, resisted it, but she knew.

“Now, I myself don’t make a habit of casting curses on children, especially ones intended to—well, you know, eliminate them. That was all Cora’s idea. We needed a reason for Emma Swan to seek you out. Something that would make her desperate enough to take her chances with you.”

“Why? Why go to all the trouble?”

“Because I’m tired of you taking up space in my castle. I’m tired of hosting a woman who imagines a hundred ways to dispose of me every time I walk through the front door. Unfortunately, Cora and I created a monster we can’t control. So go—have your happy ending. Give me back my solitude.”

“Fine.”

“Excellent! So we have a deal? Your freedom for my life?”

“And Emma and Henry,” Regina added. “They’re off limits.”

“Oh, very well. You’re no fun at all, you know.”

He procured a piece of parchment and passed it to Regina. Upon it were written the terms they had discussed. Regina read it once, twice, thrice over, wary of tricks.

“Trust me, dearie—”

“You might be able to understand why I don’t.”

“Trust me when I say I want to close this chapter. You and the princess are more trouble than you’re worth. I’ve wasted two decades on the lot of you.”

“Sorry your plans to exploit us didn’t work out.”

The Dark One rolled his eyes. “Oh, now you have a sense of humor.”

Regina watched his face carefully as she scratched her name with one of her own quills, but he already seemed to have lost interest.

He snatched it back when she was done and signed it himself; it buzzed with golden magic for a second, then snapped away into thin air, to the place where promises go.

((()))

Regina ripped through her old tower at the top of the Dark One’s castle and sent it crumbling down.

She had promised not to harm him. They’d never agreed to anything regarding his castle.

She watched her father’s things burn through the blurriness of tears. The tower went up in purple fire that sent a trail of smoke across the sky. Down in the village, people gathered in the square and on street corners, and a great collective murmur rose up as their bewilderment turned to fear.

The crazy witch of the Dark One’s Keep, finally let loose upon the world.

A part of her reveled in their fear. Let them see her, at last. Let them know what the Dark One had kept locked up in his castle, all these years.

The thrill of release zipped through her. They had tried to tame her but she could not be broken. The Dark One had said as much.

He stood in the hole in the wall where the tower had been, surrounded by the remnants of burning tapestries and magical instruments, whatever hadn’t been lost in the wreckage of the tower several stories below.

“Regina!” he screamed, jumping up and down in fury, the little imp that he was.

Regina levitated herself in the sky above him. “Something the matter?”

“This wasn’t the agreement!”

“You’re right! The contract never said anything about this.”

“Regina!” He raged hysterically, shouting expletives in all the languages he knew, but not outright cursing her, as per the terms of their contract. He could not harm her, just as she could not harm him. They had stalemated each other. Which was a shame, because she’d have loved to see what he looked like under all that scaly skin after she ripped it off, strip by strip. But a promise was a promise, and unlike some people, she kept those.

Speaking of, she had other, more important matters to attend to.

She hadn’t missed the way he’d made no attempt to include Cora in the contract. Cora was a powerful ally, but a dangerous enemy, and she and the Dark One were always flipping back and forth between the two. How convenient for him, then, if he sat back and let Regina and Cora destroy each other. Two threats eliminated for the price of one.

She hesitated before transporting herself out of Garmir.

She intended to confront her mother.

But now there was Emma.

For a moment, she considered forgetting all about her mother. Let her rot alone in the Mills manor for the rest of her miserable life, unloved and outcast.

She imagined Emma, malnourished and dirty and flea-bitten, as she had seen other street-children over the years, begging for scraps at the door or running the Dark One’s errands for a penny or two in coins.

She imagined all the years that she had looked into her mother’s face and been lied to.

Where’s Rosemary? She’d beaten at her father’s chest. What did you do to her?

Her poor father, clutching her arms and pleading with her, and after all that, taking her in his arms and weeping at the pain she was in. Her mother had stood in that room and watched them cry and called Regina a fool and a traitor, accusing her own mother of stealing a child.

And she’d believed her. For years, she’d believed her. No, she’d reasoned, whatever else Cora might do, she wouldn’t harm anyone as innocent and helpless as Rosemary.

She hadn’t considered that, if Cora was willing to beat her own daughter, she’d probably have even less qualms about harming a child that was not her own blood.

She thought of Henry.

Henry who, like fate, bore her father’s name and whose mother was her own long-lost princess, her betrothed unknowingly returned to her.

Except, it hadn’t been fate at all. Just her mother, playing more games with her. Twisting the hands of history to save herself from Regina’s wrath when Regina became too powerful to control.

That’s right, Mother. She’d tried to turn Regina into a weapon.

Well, she’d succeeded.

Screaming, she blew a wind across the world and whisked herself away in a blur of purple smoke.

((()))

Emma stared in the mirror. The surface of it shimmered and stirred. It rippled like the waves of a pool.

Magic, beneath her eyelids. Pure, turquoise-colored light that spun and sparkled and she was channeling it, letting it tunnel through her to the tips of her fingers like she’d seen Regina do dozens of times, where it flickered and sparked like a match that had just been struck.

The vibrations of it ricocheted through her body—she felt like she was on fire. A being made of light.

It didn’t hurt. It was pure energy. It snapped and popped and built up a feeling of ecstasy in her chest, until she was afraid she might explode, except it was contained, it was confined to her body, and she was safe because it was hers. Her magic. Tied to her body, buried in her blood, irreconcilable from her soul.

The whirlpool of turquoise light rippled out to create a nucleus, a center. It widened, to reveal not the glass of the mirror, but a vision of a place far from Snow White’s palace.

It felt like her very consciousness was stretching to encompass all the space between her room and Regina’s tower.

She didn’t really know how the mirrors worked, only that they were a means of communicating between vast distances. Regina kept several in her study.

The Dark One’s words had taken to haunting her days as well as her nights. _She will destroy herself. In her quest for revenge she will self-destruct. But you…maybe you have the power to stop it…_

She just needed to know that Regina was safe. If she could just see her. She wouldn’t ask for anything else. Just to see her, to confirm for herself that she was alive and would stay that way.

She hadn’t realized until then, how important it was to her that Regina was out there. Still herself. Still real. If only Emma could know that…it would be enough. She’d accept her place as Snow White’s daughter, she’d wear the crown, learn to be queen. As long as, in her heart, she knew she lived in a world where Regina existed.

The nucleus blasted open; revealing not the single, solid image of Regina’s study that she had expected, but a thousand fractured reflections. Desperation sunk like a stone in her stomach. Maybe she’d done it wrong. Maybe she’d opened up a window to somewhere else. She tried to touch the mirror’s surface but her finger passed through it, like she was trying to hold mist in her hand. It was cold and damp, and she yanked her finger back.

A knock at the door.

“Just a minute,” she cried.

“Emma?”

David. He’d taken Henry down to the training yard to watch Seth’s archery practice. It was the longest Henry had been out of her sight since they’d arrived in the White Kingdom. She heard his voice accompany David’s, and her whole body ached to go to him. The magic of the mirror shuddered and started to fade.

“No!”

She turned back to the mirror and focused desperately. She didn’t know if she’d have the strength to do it again. She didn’t really know what she’d done in the first place.

David called her name again; Henry said, “Mama?”

“Be right there!” Emma sprang across the room to make sure the door was locked. “Can—come back in a few minutes?” she gasped.

“Mam!”

Emma sighed and unlocked the door, opening it only a fraction and sticking her head out. “Er…”

“Mama, Seth has a real bow ‘n arrows!”

She winced; the bright light from the hall and Henry’s high-pitched excitement caused a dull pounding in her head. She wondered if it was a response to using magic. She was starting to feel light-headed, again.

David, sweet, miraculous David, seemed to sense something was wrong. He pried Henry away from the door and swung him up on his shoulders. “Why don’t we go see about lunch?” he suggested.

“Mama, you can come too?” Henry asked.

“Henry…”

David studied her. He was steadier than Snow, a quiet, sturdy presence to contrast her twittering, nervous energy. Emma couldn’t quite meet his eyes.

“Henry, have you ever had a cream tart?”

“What’s that?”

David gasped in mock dismay. “We’ll have to remedy this immediately, lad.”

With Henry too distracted to worry anymore about Emma, David cast her a careful, questioning look.

Emma put on her best smile and nodded. She was fine.

He didn’t look like he entirely believed her, but he acquiesced. “How about we deliver some special to your mama?” he asked Henry as he carried him away. Emma heard them chatting all the way down the hall.

She thrust the door closed, sliding the lock and returning to the mirror, where the fractured images had begun to wink, one by one, out of sight, and the swirling magical nucleus made tighter and tighter circles, shrinking slowly.

“No!”

She braced herself on the vanity and focused on forming a funnel in her mind, a channel for the magic to concentrate and shoot through—she did it instinctively, knowing what to do without thinking about it. The shrinking stopped and then reversed; the nucleus of magic shot back open, creating a wide open plane upon the surface of the mirror for her to see through.

What she saw was wreckage. Still through the fractured lens, she caught bits and pieces of rubble and broken things. She searched the window desperately for something she might recognize, trying to understand what she was looking at.

A figure stepped into sight. A shadow at first, a dark form.

“Regina!” she gasped.

A face appeared, broken up like slivers of glass.

The Dark One raised an eyebrow. “Very good!”

His voice came as if from under water, an echo or gurgle that was hard to make out.

“Hello, Emma Swan!”

“Where’s Regina!?”

“How should I know? If you find her, do tell her she owes me a new tower on my eastern wall.”

Emma began to recognize familiar things; shattered glass vials. Steaming pools of viscous liquid, spilled potions of every variety and color, bubbling up from the ground. Tapestries torn into pieces, or blackened by fire. A globe rolled by, with the little dragon inside, snorting grumpily.

The images started to fade.

“No! No! Come back!”

The Dark One pressed one, glittery eye to the mirror, and Emma began to understand. The mirror was in pieces; she was staring through many shards of glass at once, which had created the fractured picture. The mirrors must have shattered in the destruction of the tower.

“Regina did this?”

“I always warned that girl about her temper,” the Dark One grumbled. “I should have known better than to just set her loose without restrictions.”

“Loose? What do you mean?”

“Keep up, dearie! Regina’s gone.”

“G-gone?”

The Dark One rolled his eyes. “Not that kind of gone! Left! Disappeared! Flown away! Left me with quite a mess here too, I might add. She didn’t have to topple the _entire_ tower…” He scuffed his boots on the ground, muttering to himself and kicking scraps of rubble.

Emma, not daring to hope, glanced out the window. If Regina was free…

The Dark One was still watching her. “Oh, don’t expect her to show up there any time soon. Don’t you remember what I told you?”

“You told me lots of things!”

“But the most important thing."

Emma tried to remember all of the things he had said to her. "Regina Mills has scores to settle. So why aren't you dead?"

"Regina and I...came to an understanding."

Emma’s mind raced. There was only one other person that Regina would pursue her vendetta against. “Her mother,” she breathed.

“You’re a bit slow on the uptake, dearie.”

“Just tell me where she’s going!”

“I believe you just figured it out yourself.”

“No!” She pounded her fist on the vanity, causing the mirror to vibrate and the image to ripple. The Dark One’s face faded in an out of view. “You know what I mean!”

“You two are no fun at all…I mean, I suppose you were made for each other. True love and all tha—”

“Dark One!”

A burst of turquoise magic shot straight through the mirror—and appeared again on the other side, pinging off the Dark One, causing him to howl and jump up in pain.

“After all the trouble I went through to give that back to you…” He rubbed his temple where he’d been struck. “You use your magic against me?”

“Tell me what I want to know and you’ll never have to see me again.”

“Gods willing. Fine. Can you transport yourself? It’ll take several weeks to get there from Snow’s palace.”

“I’ll figure it out.”

“Very well. Listen carefully. The Mills property is heavily protected...”

((()))

“Mother!”

The wards around the Mills mansion were nothing.

Cora’s guards were nothing.

She blasted through them all.

Rage fueled her.

Henry’s sweet, inquisitive face in her mind’s eye fueled her.

Emma. The woman with an iron fortress erected around her heart. Broken and battered and still so badly needing to prove she was capable of love, even though she didn’t always know how to show it—she could barely touch her own son sometimes, she was so afraid to show it…

“Hello, darling. You know, I thought I might expect you.”

She twisted around. Her mother stood in the doorway. Silver streaked her hair these days, and crow’s feet pinched her eyes, but other than that, she hadn’t changed very much since Regina had last seen her, on the day Cora had given her away to the Dark One.

Not given away.

Traded. Sold.

To be made into a weapon for Cora’s own use.

“Don’t,” Regina rasped. “Don’t. I’m sick of your games, I’m sick of your rules.”

Cora raised an eyebrow. “What are you rambling on about, darling?”

Regina blasted a fireball in her direction, which Cora easily batted away. “You know what I’m talking about!”

“Enlighten me, please.”

“Henry!”

Regina shot another fireball. Her aim was miserably off; anger rushed through her as strong as any magic she’d ever felt, blinding her, causing full-body tremors that she couldn’t get under control.

“You’ll have to be more specific, darling.” Cora hadn’t so much as raised her hand in deflection.

Seeing her, composed and expressionless, looking bored, like she was waiting for this to be over so she could get on with her day, broke something in Regina. Cora didn’t care. She never had. What was one child to her? Two? Three? Because that was the total of lives she had ruined with her scheming and her plots. The three that Regina knew of.

She screamed.

This time, she funneled every ounce of her concentration into the strike against her mother. The magic burst from her in a shot of brilliant light, a shooting star that burned across the space between them before striking Cora directly in the chest.

Cora flew backwards, hitting the wall with a sickening thud and landing in a heap on the floor.

Regina froze. “…Mother?”

The black form twitched. Cora braced herself on the marble floor and lifted herself to her feet. She sneered at Regina. “So it’s going to be this way, is it?”

Regina’s mind raced. “It—it doesn’t have to be. Tell me how to cure Henry. Tell me what’s wrong with him, and I’ll leave you alone. Forever.”

Cora laughed. “Oh, you’ll leave me alone? How considerate of you.” She thrust out her hand and sent a steaming indigo fireball across the hall. Regina just barely managed to get her arm up across her face to deflect it.

“The boy is dying,” Cora said. “There’s nothing you can do about it.”

Regina flung a fireball back, but Cora was ready this time and sidestepped it neatly.

“Why?” she gasped. “Why does he need to die?”

“He didn’t.” Cora harnessed the fireball Regina had aimed at her and re-routed it back to her. Regina darted out of the way and let it burn out against the wall behind her. “And then you couldn’t leave well enough alone.”

“What did I do?”

“You’ve always been a meddler, Regina. You think you can cure this land? You think you can steal some hearts and that will fix it all? You want to undo my entire life’s work?”

“What work? Starving a kingdom to death?”

Cora flung a quick succession of fireballs at her, screaming, “Snow White betrayed me!” She chased Regina across the hall. “She needed to pay!”

“And thousands of innocent lives is the price?” Regina ducked and lunged behind a pillar, tossing fireballs out from behind the marble structure.

“Snow White doesn’t deserve to rule this land! She deserves to see her people suffer! Let her die in obscurity and misery in a ruined realm, knowing that she is the cause!”

“And what about Emma, Mother?” Regina blasted through the pillar, sending marble fragments spraying across the room, forcing Cora to retreat several steps to avoid being struck. Regina saw a group of servants huddled at the top of the stairs. They had sought shelter behind the railing on the second floor. “Get out of here!” Regina shouted at them, pursuing her mother across the hall. She didn’t need to have to worry about them getting caught in the cross-fires.

“What about Emma?”

They had a few moments of ceasefire as they both caught their breath.

“Emma?” Cora waved her hand. “What do I care for her?”

Tears welled up in Regina’s eyes. “She was mine, Mother.”

“You hated the child.”

“But she was a child! As I was a child! You stole our lives from us.”

“Snow White is just as responsible—”

“I know!” Regina yelled. “I know! You’re right! She is! I wonder sometimes, if Snow White’s no better than you. Playing games with children, throwing our lives around as if we’re jewels or caches of gold, trading us back and forth to satisfy your own ambition.”

Cora had regained her balance and indigo flames sparked once more in her hands. But Regina was faster, and she shot a fireball before her mother’s could form—she aimed for Cora’s hands and this time aimed true. The flame burnt through the skin of her mother’s right hand, her dominant throwing hand…

Cora screeched in pain and threw up a barrier of magic that Regina would not so easily be able to pierce. Regina circled the shield, searching for a weakness.

Her mother clutched her wounded hand, hissing in pain as she tried to collect herself.

She looked very old and frail in that moment, hunched over and moaning quietly.

Regina laughed. “Putting on a show for me, Mother? Don’t worry—I refuse to waste my pity on you.”

Cora looked up; her eyes were black slits; her magic slithered around her, erupting from her legs and arms, turning her hair to indigo smoke.

For a split second, Regina was well and truly afraid.

Her mother looked like a monster.

But Regina’s instinct had been right; her mother’s performance of pain had been just that. A show, designed to weaken Regina’s defenses.

“That’s not going to work on me anymore, Mother,” Regina said. “I’m not a child.”

“Oh, Regina.” Cora chuckled. “You will always be a child. Caught up in your head, falling in love with anyone who shows you the least bit of affection…you think Emma Swan loved you? She needed you, Regina. She was using you. That’s what people do. They use each other. You used her too.”

Regina shook her head. “You’re wrong.”

“Am I?”

Regina sent another fireball flying in her direction, but her very skin seemed to deflect it now, the smoky magic floating off of her like some sort of built-in protection. Regina had never seen anything like it, hadn’t known magic could do that.

She began to grow desperate. She dodged a series of shots cast by her mother, unable to land any of her own, even though her aim was the better of the two.

“Where is she then, this Emma?” Cora snarled. “Why did she leave you alone in that castle?”

“Because,” Regina said. “Her family…”

“If she loved you, she would have chosen you. But no. She left the moment she was offered something better. How could life with you, trapped in the dark spaces of the world, possibly compare to life as royalty?”

“You wouldn’t know, would you, Mother?” Regina said coldly.

Cora screamed; Regina threw herself behind another pillar. It cracked beneath the force of her mother’s magic, and Regina followed the fracture up, up, up as it split open the ceiling.

“Has she tried to contact you?” Cora taunted. “Has she even acknowledged your existence since she returned to her precious pampered palace life? They’re all the same, Regina, darling. They reject people like you and I, who embrace the darkness, when really they’re no better. They’re hypocrites who won’t admit what they are. Instead they lie and steal and exploit the rest of us, to keep their power and their reputations, as champions of some utopia of light that doesn’t exist and never could, thanks to people like them.”

An idea began to form. Regina followed the fracture in the wall all the way up to the ceiling; there were three other pillars holding up the roof, all central to the structural integrity of this part of the manor.

Her mother was stalking across the room, still ranting and raving. Regina barely heard her.

She was thinking.

She was thinking how she’d never really expected to come out of this alive.

This isn’t a story of redemption. This is a story of resetting the balance.

She closed her eyes and leaned against the unstable pillar. She was so tired. It had been such a long life.

She thought of Emma.

Emma, smiling in the sun of a garden that was destroyed, now that Regina had torn down the tower. Emma, soft and vulnerable and open beneath her. She would have liked to do that again. Once was not nearly enough to ease the craving she had for Emma’s taste and touch and smell. But all things considered, she’d gotten far more than she probably deserved. More than she’d ever dreamed.

She could live with that.

She could die with it, too.

((()))

Emma saw the collapse of the manor from a distance. She had figured out the teleportation after several frustrating failures. Her final attempt brought her closer than any of the others, but she was still caught in a field of cattle far from the manor itself when it crumbled in a great swirl of smoke and dust, shooting rumbling vibrations across the land.

She stumbled and fell against a cow, who lowed in alarm. The rest of the herd huddled together and moved en masse over the hill, far to the other side of the pasture and away from the aftershocks of the manor’s collapse.

Regina.

Emma took off at a run.

As she neared the ruin she shouted Regina’s name, but the closer she got the more she filled with dread. The destruction was total. Not a single stairwell left standing. The house had been all but obliterated to dust. She coughed and covered her mouth with a sleeve, peering through the dust and grime, trying to discern any possible movement.

Nearby, a group of men and women gathered, mostly stable-hands, by the looks of it.

She coughed and climbed over a pile of rubble. “Is everyone alright?”

They looked confused by her arrival, but examined each other and nodded. No major injuries. They were mostly just spooked.

She darted back into the debris, despite their calls of alarm once they realized where she was going. “Regina!” she shouted. Then coughed up a mouthful of dust. “Regina!’

Nothing.

((()))

She sank down into darkness.

Her body felt like it was floating. Weightless. Easy.

She thought she might stay here for a while. There was a great pressure bearing down on top of her, but she didn’t experience any pain.

((()))

Emma threw aside a heavy wood panel. Her throat was coated in dust. She’d shouted herself hoarse, but still, she called Regina’s name. She found herself at the edge of the ruins and scanned the forest, thinking maybe Regina had fled before the manor collapsed, or somehow destroyed it from a distance. But then, if that was the case, surely she would have replied by now.

((()))

She was dreaming.

A sweet voice sang her name.

She wanted to tunnel into that voice. Bury herself inside it and sleep for a long, long time.

((()))

Tears tracked through the grime and dirt that covered Emma’s cheeks and nose.

((()))

“Oh,” Regina breathed.

The pressure was lifted. She opened her eyes and found herself staring into a familiar face.

Then arms were around her, and she heard someone laughing and crying, and realized that maybe it was her. Someone’s nose touched her nose, and the presence felt so solid and real that she knew she wasn’t dreaming.

This was better than a dream.

“You insane woman.” Emma nuzzled their noses over and over. “You crazy…batshit…”

Regina fluttered her eyelashes against wet cheeks. “If you want me to kiss you,” she said, swallowing against the sandpaper feeling in her throat. “You should stop insulting me.”

But then Emma was the one who kissed her, hard and repeatedly, and Regina discovered she was so, so very happy to be alive.

“Look,” Emma said, still crying. She pulled something out of her pocket. It was a little white wildflower.

((()))

They never found Cora’s body.

“She’s not coming back,” Regina said. “She barely existed in the physical world by the time the manor collapsed on top of her. I don’t think there’s a body to find. She’s just…gone.”

She sat on the ground next to a fire Emma had built, showing off her magic by lighting it with a little concentration and the tip of her finger.

“Clever girl,” Regina said, smiling as Emma sat down and pulled her close.

“I learned this, too,” Emma said, spinning her finger in circles in the air until a tiny corridor opened before them, breaking the barriers of time and space. Not big enough for them to walk through, but just the right size to watch Henry snuggled up in bed as Snow White sang him to sleep.

“She’s singing it wrong,” Regina whispered.

“Shush.”

Emma closed the window once Henry dipped off into dreamland and they saw for themselves that he drowsed peacefully. Regina wouldn’t know for sure until she could be at his side and examine him thoroughly, but with Cora gone, the curse she’d placed on him should have weakened enough that he’d be cured with a little rest and one more batch of Regina’s elixir.

In the morning Emma woke her with a sweet, close-mouthed kiss.

“Before we go home,” she said. “We have to do something first.”

She dug around in her satchel. Then she was placing a bundle in Regina’s arms, and when she unwrapped the cloth there were her flowers, her little white petals that she had nurtured for so long, had fought and killed and nearly died for.

“We can plant them before we go back,” Emma said.

They’d plant a trail of them all the way from here to the capitol. It would take time, but by next planting season the soil would be rich and moist enough to support a full harvest.

They rooted down the first one at the edge of the clearing where the Mills manor had stood.

“You really don’t remember this place?” Regina asked.

“Nothing.”

“It’s probably better that way. I sort of hated you.”

“You know, I think I've heard that story before.” She winked.

Regina bumped her shoulder. "Can I tell it again? There's a different ending this time."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oi! those last two chapters were rough. I didn't proofread so much as a single word of this thing in my rush to finish it, and I don't even want to think about the number of unresolved b-plots buutttt...it's done. it's out. I hope you liked it! If you made it this far, you're a saint. And thank you so much to Cyan for their lovely art! It was such a pleasure getting to collaborate across mediums! 
> 
> Thanks to everyone who runs this event! It was such a lot of fun and I can't wait to read everyone's submissions.
> 
> Edit: thank you for everyone’s amazing comments so far, i definitely have plans to respond to them when I get the chance! But for now here is a blanket statement of my appreciation haha


End file.
